Zihvavy  of t:Ke  'theological  ^mimvy 

PRINCETON  •  NEW  JERSEY 


PRESENTED  BY 


PRESENTED  BY 

Dr.  Allison  Bryan 
Z%o.^^  of  «ort 


{pmc^txs  of  t^t 


TNB  LORD  BISHOP  OF  WINCHESTER 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2015 


https://archive.org/details/gospelofworkOOthor 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  WORK 


JAN 


ANTHONY  W.  THOROLD,  D.D. 

LORD  BISHOP  OF  WINCHESTER 

PRELATE  OF  THE  MOST  NOBLE  ORDER  OF  THE  GARTER 
HON.  FELLOW  OF  QUEEN's  COLLEGE,  OXFORD 


We  ascend  by  one  another  " 


NEW  YORK 
E.  P.  BUTTON  &  CO. 
31,  WEST  TWENTY-THIRD  STREET 

1893 


"The  Church  is  not  responsible  for  saving  the  world ;  she  is 
responsible  for  holding  up  to  the  world  what  is  alone  a  real  salvation  : 
if   the  world  will  be  ignorant,  let  it  be  ignorant," — Professor 

MiLLIGAN. 


TO  THE  DEAR  MEMORY  OF 

PHILLIPS  BROOKS,  D.D., 

BISHOP  OF  MASSACHUSETTS. 

STRONG,    FEARLESS,   TENDER,  ELOQUENT, 
INCAPABLE  OF  MEANNESS, 
BLAZINd  W  ITH  INDIGNATION  AT  ALL  KINDS  OK  WRONG, 
HIS  HEART  AND  MIND  DEEP  AND  WIDE  AS 

THE  OCEAN  AT  HIS  DOOR, 
SIMPLE   AND    TRANSPARENT   AS  A  CHILD, 
KEEN  WITH  ALL  THE  KEENNESS  OF  HIS  RACE, 

THIS  VOLUME  IS  INSCRIBED 
BY  A  BROTHER  ACROSS  THE  WATER, 

WHO  CHERISHES  HIS  FRIENDSHIP  AS  A 

TREASURE  LAID  UP  IN  HEAVEN, 
AT  THE  RESURRECTION  OF  THE  JUST. 

A.  W. 


^  3 


"It  is  not  evror  which  opposes  the  progress  of  truth  :  it  is  indolence, 
obstinacy,  the  spirit  of  routine,  everything  that  favours  inaction." 


PREFACE. 


For  centuries  the  world  has  been  listenmg  to  sermons, 
and,  while  cheerfully  dispensing  with  the  hour-glass,  can 
Hsten  to  them  still.  Occasionally,  also,  it  reads  them,  not 
quite  unwisely,  for  a  good  sermon  is,  without  dispute,  the 
most  convenient  method  possible  for  conveying  to  busy 
men,  in  a  compact  and  luminous  summary,  the  facts,  and 
ideas,  and  principles,  and  aspirations  which  are  the  only 
reasonable  explanation  of  the  existence  of  the  Church,  as 
well  as  of  the  religion  of  her  Divine  Head. 

Preachers,  if  they  are  wise,  and  conscious  of  their 
limitations,  will  usually  be  found  to  be  even  greedy  readers 
of  sermons,  whereby  they  seize  and  retain  the  inspiration 
of  the  loftier  spirits,  and  become  fired  with  the  glow  and 
heat  of  saintly  thinkers,  in  whom  the  love  of  Christ  and  the 
passion  for  souls  burn  with  an  unquenchable  fire.  They 
will  also  be  only  too  thankful  to  discover  and  master  those 
minor  details  of  style  and  arrangement,  which  some  who 
think  more  highly  of  themselves  than  they  ought  to  think 
may  flippantly  despise  as  technical  rudiments,  but  which 
the  wise  will  almost  eagerly  appreciate  as  helping  them 
more  adequately  to  use  the  grandest  opportunity  man  ever 
vouchsafes  to  man,  for  the  delivery,  without  interruption. 


viii 


PREFACE. 


save,  at  the  worst,  of  an  ill-concealed  weariness  in  his 
hearers,  of  a  message  about  which  nothing  higher  can  be 
said  than  that  it  is  Divine. 

One,  however,  who  presumes  not  only  to  preach  sermons 
but  to  publish  them,  will,  if  reasonably  modest,  never  quite 
acquit  himself,  in  those  moments  of  reaction  with  which 
we  are  all  so  familiar,  of  an  incredible  rashness  in  doing 
so;  will  also  be  conscious  of  a  secret  trepidation  lest  all 
that  is  in  his  volume,  recognizable  as  actually  his  own, 
should  be  blandly  pronounced  by  the  critics  as  hardly  de- 
serving of  the  permanence  desired  for  it ;  while  anything 
found  in  it  that  is  readable,  or  striking,  or  profound, 
should  presently  be  disinterred  from  some  forgotten  volume, 
as  having  been  much  better  expressed  by  some  one  else. 

It  is  perhaps  fair  to  observe,  that  to  be  a  preacher, 
one  must  first  be  a  student ;  and  a  student  is  one  who, 
while  he  should  ever  be  conscious  of  his  indebtedness  to 
others,  and  sincerely  grateful  to  them,  cannot  always  be 
expected  to  remember  where  or  when  this  or  that  thought 
became  assimilated  to  his  own  mental  consciousness,  and 
was  put  away  among  his  other  treasures,  without  a  label 
to  mark  from  whom  it  was  first  borrowed.  A  man  of 
genius  of  our  own  time  has  said,  "  One  could  not  open 
one's  lips,  if  one  was  bound  to  say  what  nobody  else  had 
said."  In  this  volume — the  title  and  subjects  of  which  will, 
1  trust,  sufficiently  justify  themselves — I  have  honestly 
done  my  best  to  acknowledge  my  obligation  to  those  whose 
help  I  recognize,  and  for  whose  writings  I  have  a  sincere 
gratitude.  The  Book,  of  course,  to  which  one  wishes  to 
owe  most,  is  the  Word  of  God.  If,  however,  of  two  out  of 
many  other  authors — both  of  them  now  in  their  rest — I 
might  express  the  hope  that  here  and  there  these  humble 


PREFACE. 


pages  may  be  found  to  gleam  with  their  serene  wisdom 
and  their  magnificent  aspirations,  I  may  be  permitted 
to  acknowledge  what  a  debt  for  many  years  past  I  have 
felt  to  owe  to  the  refined  and  wide  culture  of  Richard 
William  Church,  once  Dean  of  St.  Paul's;  as  well  as  to 
Phillips  Brooks,  late  Bishop  of  Massachusetts,  who,  more 
than  any  preacher  I  know,  takes  his  hearers  by  the  hand, 
to  bring  them  into  the  living  presence  and  to  the  personal 
love  and  to  the  ineffable  vision  of  Jesus,  Son  of  God. 

A.  W. 

Farnham  Castlk, 
Easter,  1 893- 


"  True  Catholicity  can  never  come  about  as  the  result  of  an  eclectic 
or  a  levelling  process.    It  never  was,  or  ^Yill  be,  made  to  order." 


C  O  N  T  E  N  1'  S  . 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 

I'AGE 

'  I  am  debtor."— Rom.  i.  14         ...         ...         ...         ...  1 

Preached  in  St.  James's^  Winnipeg^  August  12,  1887. 

THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 

'  Wherefore,  O  king  Agrippa,  I  was  not  disobedient  unto  the 

heavenly  vision." — Acts  xxvi.  19  ...         ...         ...  15 

Preached  in  Cuddesdon  Parish  Church,  June  14,  1892. 

DISCIPLINE. 

And  he  took  the  fire  in  his  hand,  and  a  knife  ;  and  they  went 
both  of  them  together." — Gen.  xxii.  6  ...  ...         ...  29 

Preached  in  St.  PauTs  Cathedral,  February  27,  1887. 

MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 
"  Able  ministers  of  the  New  Testament." — 2  COR.  iii.  6  ...  41 

THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 
"  But  He  answered  her  not  a  word." — Matt.  xv.  23  ...         ...  57 

Preached  in  the  Chapel  Royal ^  St.  James's,  March  2,  1890. 

THE  POWER  OF  COURAGE. 
' '  Fear  not,  but  let  your  hands  be  strong." — Zech.  viii.  13       ,.,  71 
Preached  at  the  Consecration  of  Lyss  Churchy  July  2,  1892. 


Xll  CONTENTS. 

THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 

TACE 

The  seed  is  the  Word  of  God." — LuKEviii.  ii        ...  ...  Si 

Preached  in  St.  PatiVs  Cathedral,  May  12,  1S90. 

DETERIORATION. 
"  In  the  ship  mending  their  nets." — Mark  i.  19        ...         ...  07 

Preached  at  Half-way  Tree  Parish  Church,  Jamaica^ 
March  31,  1886. 

TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 
"  Lay  up  for  yourselves  treasures  in  heaven." — Matt.  vi.  20    ...  107 
Preached  in  Winchester  Cathedral,  Ash  Wednesday,  1892, 

SYMPATHY. 

*•  Who  is  weak,  and  I  am  not  weak  ?  who  is  offended,  and  I  burn 

not?" — 2  Cor.  xi.  29  ...         ...         ...         ...  119 

Preached  in  ]Vinchester  Cathedral,  Sexagcsima  Sunday,  1892. 

THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 
"  Where  ia  the  promise  of  His  coming?  " — 2  Pet.  iii.  4  ...  131 

Preached  in  Rochester  Cathedral,  December  a,,  1S83. 

DEATH  NOT  DEATPI. 
"Verily,  verily,' I  say  unto  you,  If  a  man  keep  My  saying,  he 

shall  never  see  death." — ^John  viii.  51    ...  ...  ...  145 

Preached  in  the  Cathedral,  Victoria,  Vancouver  Island, 
September  1887. 

THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 
"And  I  saw  the  dead,  small  and  great,  stand  before  God  ;  and 

the  books  were  opened." — Rev.  xx.  12...  ...  ...  157 

Preached  in  Winchester  Cathedral,  Advoit  Sunday,  1892. 

THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 
'And  they  shall  ^ec  His  face  ;  and  His  Name  shall  be  in  ihcir 

foreheads." — Rev.  xxii.  4.       ...  ...  ...  ...  169 

Preached  in  Rochester  Cathedral,  December  i,  1890. 


Bibliography    ...         ...         ...         ...         ...         ...  181 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


"  Lord,  I  am  coming  as  fast  a>  T  can.  I  know  I  must  pass  llirough 
the  shadow  of  death,  before  T  can  come  to  see  Thee.  But  it  is  but 
Umbra  Mortis,  a  mere  shadow  of  death,  a  little  darkness  upon  nature. 
]jut  Thou,  through  Thy  merits  and  Passion,  hast  broken  through  the 
jaws  of  death," — Archbishop  LaiicTs  last  tvords  on  tJie  scaffold. 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


Preached  in  St.  James" s,  Winnipeg^  August  12,  18S7. 
'*  I  am  debtor." — ROM.  i.  14. 

Fairly,  I  think,  and  not  cynically,  the  world  maybe  divided 
into  two  classes.  One  is  of  those  who  are  constantly  occupied 
with  considering  what  society  owes  to  them ;  the  other  is  of 
those  who  are  even  more  anxious  to  discover  what  they 
owe  to  society.  We  need  not  pause  to  inquire  which  of 
these  two  classes  is  the  more  numerous,  or  the  nobler,  or 
to  which  mankind  owes  more  of  truth  and  virtue,  or  to 
which  of  them  St.  Paul  belonged.  For  it  is,  of  course, 
quite  fair  to  remark  that  as  a  Hebrew,  and  an  apostle,  he 
must  have  felt  this  sense  of  indebtedness  in  an  especial 
degree. 

As  a  member  of  an  essentially  missionary  race,  chosen 
by  God  to  be  salt  and  light  amidst  corruption  and  darkness, 
and  to  be  the  depository  of  the  divine  oracles  until,  in  the 
fulness  of  time,  Christ  should  come  in  the  flesh  to  explain 
and  fulfil  them,  he  was  a  debtor  from,  and  even  by  reason 
of,  his  birth.  Then,  as  an  apostle,  to  whom  the  Lord  Him- 
self gave  the  commission  to  declare  the  glad  tidings  of 
reconciliation  to  the  Gentiles,  he  apparently  felt  the  blessed 
necessity  of  preaching  the  gospel  as  perhaps  no  man  ever 


4 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


felt  it  before  or  since.  Woe  is  unto  me  if  I  preach  not 
the  gospel ! " 

Now,  from  the  particular  duty  I'  want  instantly  to  pass 
to  the  universal  obligation.  The  Church's  conscience  is 
stirred  by  an  unspeakable  gratitude  to  her  great  task  of 
evangelizing  the  nations.  Let  each  of  us,  in  the  solitary 
and  invisible  region  of  his  own  conscience,  ponder  for  him- 
self the  meaning  of  this  sentence,  "I  am  debtor;"  apply 
to  his  own  soul  the  wide  obligation  of  it,  ''How  much 
owe  I  unto  my  Lord  ?  "  try  to  weigh  its  blessedness,  "  I 
owe  Thee  my  life  ;  "  and  to  conceive  its  mighty  reward  for 
him,  if  ever  so  feebly,  yet  consistently  and  resolutely,  it 
sliall  have  coloured  and  shaped  his  years.    "  I  am  debtor." 

Observe  here  the  secret  of  God,  the  burden  of  the  Church, 
the  safety  of  the  nation,  the  enthusiasm  of  the  Christian. 

What  is  the  debt  ?  It  is,  superficially  to  speak  of  it, 
threefold,  and  I  can  only  indicate,  not  pretend  to  expound, 
its  substance.  Truth,  example,  and  charity.  That  man  owes 
truth  to  man;  and  that  just  in  proportion  to  his  own  appre- 
hension of  the  value  of  it,  and  his  personal  appropriation 
of  the  substance  of  it,  and  his  recognition  of  the  need  of 
it  for  all,  to  cheer,  elevate,  dignify,  develop,  and  complete 
liuman  nature,  will  be  his  readiness,  even  at  personal  cost,  to 
dispense  it  to  others.  A  university  is,  of  course,  the  most 
majestic  embodiment  of  the  idea  that  truth  is  the  inheritance 
of  the  race— that  only  the  learner  can  claim  to  be  the 
teacher — and  that  the  best  and  noblest  hospitality  is  the 
hospitality  of  the  mind,  joyfully  welcoming  all  men  into  its 
temple  of  knowledge.  But  any  elementary  school  for  the 
humblest  and  poorest  is  but  the  development  of  that  prin- 
ciple to  its  final  logical  issues.  Then,  if  the  great  truths 
of  physics,  and  mathematics,  and  philosophy,  and  history, 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS.  5 

which  fill  human  life  and  thought  with  dignity  and  power 
and  gladness,  are  to  be  passed  on  as  readily  and  constantly 
and  cheaply  as  possible  to  those  whom  they  concern,  how 
much  more  those  vast  spiritual  truths,  which  express  the 
only  realities,  which  help  us  to  see  through  the  veil  that 
separates  the  visible  from  the  invisible,  the  present  from  the 
future  and  the  past,  telling  us  of  a  divine  order  running 
through  our  lives,  of  the  mind  and  purpose  of  God  about 
us,  of  mercy  and  judgment,  of  the  way  of  peace,  of  the  hope 
laid  up  for  us  in  heaven,  when  earth,  with  its  sins,  and 
cares,  and  troubles,  and  battles,  is  behind  us,  and  we  see 
God  ! 

Another  part  of  our  debt  is  example — the  daily,  uncon- 
scious, natural,  yet  often  supernatural  exhibition  of  simple 
unconscious  goodness.  "  None  of  us  liveth  to  himself, 
and  no  man  dieth  to  himself."  "We  here  to-day  may 
have  already  experienced  this,  almost  without  knowing  it. 
Nothing  is  so  helpful  in  a  great  congregation  of  worshippers 
as  reverence.  Can  we  have  too  much  of  it  ?  It  suddenly 
recalls  the  listless,  summons  the  indevout  to  self-recollection, 
silently  rebukes  the  distracted,  stirs  the  devotion  even  of 
the  worshipping  heart  to  cleave  nearer  to  God.  So,  on  the 
other  hand,  how  easily  may  souls  be  chilled,  tempted, 
hardened  by  continuous  and  deliberate  irreverence  !  There 
is  nothing  so  irresistible  as  a  good  example ;  nothing  that  is 
more  in  our  own  power  ;  nothing,  also,  to  which  our  obliga- 
tion is  so  supreme. 

Charity  is  the  other  part  of  our  debt,  in  relations  and 
proportions  and  degrees  which  justice  compels,  observation 
indicates,  and  occasion  supplies.  Oh,  if  this  were  but  more 
constantly  recognized,  if  we  would,  all  of  us,  be  more 
willing  to  understand  how  much  the  happiness  and  good- 


6 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


ness  of  others  is  in  our  power,  just  through  our  showing 
them  kindness,  what  a  changed  world   this  might  be! 

Owe  no  man  anything,  but  to  love  one  another."  That 
debt,  who  pays  fully?  and  how  few  consent  to  owing  it, 
much  less  attempt  to  discharge  it !  But  whether  we  know 
it  or  not,  care  for  it  or  not,  we  do  owe  each  otiier  charity, 
and  men  expect  it  of  us,  and  God  will  judge  us  about  it ; 
and  the  best  proof  of  the  righteousness  of  the  claim  is, 
that  we  feel  it  a  real  wrong  if  it  is  denied  to  ourselves. 

So  much  for  the  debt. 

But  to  whom  is  the  debt  owed  ? 

First  let  me  observe,  in  passing,  that  we  owe  ourselves 
a  debt.  The  debt,  I  mean,  of  subjecting  the  lower  to  the 
higher  nature,  the  senses  to  the  spirit,  inclination  to  duty,  the 
immediate  present  to  the  far-distant  future.  Unless  man 
holds  himself  in  constant  and  intelligent  check,  is  distinctly 
conscious  of  the  dual  forces  in  his  moral  being,  resolving 
which  of  them  shall  be  supreme,  and  careful  to  make  the 
spiritual  supreme,  he  may  save  himself  the  trouble  of 
inquiring  who  outside  of  him  have  claims  upon  him ;  for 
they  are  claims  that  will  never  be  recognized,  much  less  be 
paid. 

But,  our  personal  responsibility  apart,  it  is  to  God  and 
our  neighbour  that  our  debt  is  due.  To  God,  who  reveals 
truth  that  we  may  believe  and  assimilate  it,  who  proclaims 
righteousness  that  we  may  recognize  and  desire  it,  who 
invites  love  that  we  may  surrender  Him  our  hearts.  Who 
shall  attempt  to  measure  the  greatness  of  our  debt  to  God  ? 
As  our  Maker,  He  appeals  to  our  conscience ;  as  our  Father, 
He  demands  our  affections.  The  earth  is  full  of  His  mercy, 
and  into  each  of  our  mouths  doth  He  constantly  put  a  new 
song.  Of  course,  the  two  great  mercies,  the  one  transcending 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


7 


our  intelligence,  and  the  other  exhausting  our  hopes,  are  the 
possession  of  His  divine  image,  in  however  a  soiled  and 
fragmentary  way;  with  that  which  is  essentially  bound 
up  with  it,  our  hope — may  I  not  say  our  sense? — of 
immortality. 

I  quite  admit  that,  but  for  these  two  inestimable  and 
undeniable  blessings,  it  might  be  easy  enough  to  show 
that  human  life  is  not  worth  the  living.  Most  of  you  would 
concur  in  that.  But  to  be  made  in  the  likeness  of  God, 
and  to  have  the  hope  of  the  fruition  of  His  glorious 
Godhead  in  life  everlasting,  is  a  mercy  indeed ;  and  the 
first  thought  that  should  meet  us  at  waking,  the  central 
thought  that  should  occui:)y  us  among  the  absorbing  and 
varied  activities  of  the  day,  the  last  thought  that  should 
solemnize  us  before  we  fall  asleep,  should  be — To  God,  all- 
wise,  almighty,  all-good,  "  I  am  debtor."  Shall  I  rob 
God? 

But  we  are  also  debtors  to  man.  You  remember, 
of  course,  how  a  lawyer  once  tried  to  evade  Christ's  com- 
prehensive precept  about  loving  with  the  question,  "  Who 
is  my  neighbour  ?  "  and  how  wonderfully  yet  unanswerably 
Christ,  in  the  parable  of  the  good  Samaritan,  replied.  He 
is  my  neighbour  who  needs  me,  whose  need  I  come  across, 
know  and  have  power  to  satisfy  without  injustice  to  the 
nearer  claims  of  others.  Brethren,  brethren,  it  is  a 
tremendous,  almost  an  appalling,  thought  how  much  we 
owe  each  other,  and  how  little  aware  of  it  many  of  us  seem 
to  be. 

What  a  debt  of  truth  we  owe,  in  the  social  intercourse 
we  enjoy,  whether  in  the  opinions  we  propound,  or  in  the 
books  we  read,  or  in  the  commonest  words  we  say  !  What 
a  debt  of  example  to  all  those  into  whose  company  we 


8 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


pass,  so  frequently,  so  thoughtlessly,  and  whom  all  of  us 
more  or  less  potently  influence  to  a  degree  we  can  hardly 
tell,  but  shall  one  day  be  judged  for.  The  children  who 
watch  us,  the  domestics  who  attend  on  us,  the  neighbours 
who  consort  with  us,  the  friends  whose  very  love  gives  our 
behaviour  a  persuasive  power, — all  these  more  or  less  are 
affected  by  the  moral  atmosphere  which  every  human  being 
inevitably  takes  with  him  wherever  he  goes. 

And  then  there  are  the  millions  beyond,  whether  in  our 
own  empire,  or  other  Christian  lands,  or  among  the  vast 
peoples  of  heathendom.  Have  we  nothing  to  do  with  them 
— have  they  nothing  to  claim  from  us  ?  If  the  Hebrew  race 
was  the  missionary  nation  of  the  world  before  the  Advent, 
judging  from  the  extent  of  her  dominion,  the  pervasiveness 
of  her  commerce,  the  spread  of  her  language,  the  greatness 
of  her  resources,  the  grandeur  of  her  name,  and  the  multitude 
of  her  opportunities,  Britain  is  the  missionary  nation  of  the 
world  between  the  Advents.  May  she  not  despise  herself  in 
despising  the  souls  committed  to  her  keeping !  May  she 
say  to  India  and  Africa  and  China,  and  to  the  uttermost 
islands  of  the  sea,    I  am  debtor  "  ! 

But  the  easiest  part  of  my  task  is  done — the  part  to 
which  none  will  demur  who  call  themselves  Christians. 

Now  I  have  to  show — what  Christian  folk  everywhere 
have  to  learn — the  secret  of  the  sense  of  indebtedness. 

I  am  debtor,"  but  do  I  feel  it,  and  do  I  care  for  it  ? 
Is  the  debt  too  great  for  me  even  to  begin  to  try  to  pay 
it,  or  too  remote  for  God  to  expect  it  of  me;  a  precept 
as  much  above  my  reach  as  a  fixed  star,  as  much  outside 
my  conscience  as  the  paganism  of  Julius  Caesar  ;  or,  indeed, 
if  recognized  as  a  sort  of  duty,  recognized  just  out  of  its 
burdensomeness,  approached  with  reluctance,  handled  with 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


9 


levity,  and  dismissed  with  joy?  The  secret  of  it  all  is  in 
discovering  our  real  relation  to  those  who  claim  our  duty 
from  us,  and  thereby  and  entirely  transforming  the  burden 
and  difficulty  of  what  may  prove  a  real  sacrifice  into  a  motive 
and  force  of  life. 

The  great  fact  of  redemi^tion  is  the  true  key  to  it  all. 
For  it  shows  us  at  once  the  real  value  of  our  own  being, 
and  the  worth  of  our  fellow-men,  and  the  clearness  and 
loveliness  of  God.  When  I  see  at  what  cost  I  have  been 
redeemed,  and  for  what  purpose,  I  find  it  worth  while  to 
subdue  and  to  discipline  myself  for  what  is  to  come  out  of 
it.  If  my  citizenship  is  in  heaven,  and  I  am  on  my  way 
there,  I  can  wait,  and  it  is  worth  my  while. 

"  The  world  passeth  away,  and  the  lust  thereof :  but  he 
that  doeth  the  will  of  God  abideth  for  ever."  The  character 
which  I  am  building,  the  purpose  which  I  am  accomplishing, 
the  mind  which  I  am  cultivating,  the  motives  which  I  am 
accepting,  are  all  weaving  the  vestment  of  my  immortality. 
"  The  things  which  are  seen  are  temporal,  but  the  things 
which  are  not  seen  are  eternal."  If  God  has  set  such  a 
price  upon  me,  let  me  assent  to  it,  and  respect  myself, 
and  live  as  becomes  one  who  is  the  brother  of  His  in- 
carnate Son. 

So  with  my  fellow-man,  whoever  he  be,  or  by  whatever 
name  he  may  be  called.  How  can  I  despise  him,  for  Jesus 
shares  his  nature  ?  how  can  I  despair  of  him,  for  Jesus  has 
redeemed  his  hfe?  The  awful  verity  of  the  Incarnation 
casts  an  incredible  and  ineffable  dignity  on  the  very 
meanest  human  soul.  The  Papuan  savage,  the  Chippewa 
Indian,  the  Malay  pirate,  the  ferocious  Arab  of  the  Soudan, 
the  filthiest  and  roughest  child  out  of  a  London  gutter,  all 
share  the  nature  with  which  it  has  pleased  the  Eternal  Son  of 


lO 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


God  to  invest  His  Divine  Personality — have  as  much  right 
to  call  him  Kinsman  according  to  the  flesh  as  St.  Paul  had. 
But  observe  how  much  ne.irer  am  I  thereby  brought  to 
them.  How  much  easier  is  it  for  me  to  care  for  them 
when,  not  only  through  our  common  humanity,  but  by  our 
one  redemption,  we  are  doubly  kinsfolk,  as  fellow-heirs  of 
God  !  And  God — how  dear  and  glorious  He  becomes, 
when  we  humbly  meditate  on  Him  in  the  light  of  the  fact 
of  redemption  !  The  awfulness  of  our  sin  and  the  infinite- 
ness  of  His  love  are -alike  made  manifest  in  the  shame 
and  anguish  of  the  Cross. 

"  I  gave  My  life  for  thee  ; 
My  precious  blood  I  slied, 
That  thou  might'st  ransomed  be, 
And  quickened  from  the  dead. 
I  gave  my  life  for  thee  : 
What  hast  thou  given  for  Me  ?" 

It  may  have  happened  to  some  of  you,  in  your  own 
glorious  continent,  to  have  been  travelling  by  night  through 
a  sublime  and  beautiful  country.  At  first  all  was  shrouded 
in  the  thick  darkness — though  the  beauty  was  there,  and 
you  felt  it.  Now  and  then,  to  be  sure,  you  caught  the  quick 
white  flash  of  a  great  waterfall,  or,  as  the  train  thundered 
over  a  bridge,  you  could  hear  the  rushing  of  the  deep  river  far 
below ;  sometim,^s  you  had  a  gUmpse  of  thick  forest,  some- 
times you  were  conscious  of  hastening  past  great  drifts  of 
snow.  You  fell  asleep,  and  when  you  woke  all  was  changed. 
The  peaks  of  the  grave  mountains  were  touched  in  the  rosy 
light,  and  a  fair  landscape,  beautified,  almost  created  by  the 
sunrise,  glitt.red  and  smiled  around  you.  All  your  senses 
had  their  full  scope  of  enjoyment;  you  seemed  suddenly 
to  have  passed  into  a  new  and  living  world. 

Just  s 3  is  it  when  the  fact  of  redemption,  grasped  and 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


tasted  in  the  personal  consciousness  of  it,  throws  its  inspiring 
splendour  upon  the  value  and  destiny  of  mankind. 

"  Lord,  what  is  man,  that  Thou  art  mindful  of  him  ? 
and  the  son  of  man,  that  Thou  visitest  him?"  is  no  doubt 
the  first,  the  abstract,  the  overwhelming  difficulty,  when  we 
remember  that  this  tiny  planet  of  ours  is  but  as  a  speck  of 
light  in  an  immeasurable  universe  of  worlds  ;  and  yet  we  are 
quietly  invited  to  believe  that  He  who  by  the  breath  of  His 
mouth  called  that  universe  into  being,  became  a  creature — 
suffered  and  died  for  this  insignificant  human  race. 

But  the  gospel  outside  us  responds  to  the  gospel  within 
us;  the  testimony  of  man  confirms  the  salvation  of  God. 
]\Ian  is  redeemed,  and  he  knows  it ;  and  because  man 
is  precious  to  God,  man  must  be  precious  to  his  brother. 

The  love  of  Christ  constraineth  us  ;  because  we  thus  judge, 
that  if  one  died  for  all,  then  were  all  dead ;  and  that  He 
died  for  all,  that  they  which  live  should  henceforth  not 
live  unto  themselves,  but  unto  Him  which  died  for  them 
and  rose  again." 

My  brethren,  believe  me,  this  is  the  true  motive  of 
Christian  missions,  and  there  is  no  other.  If  that  will  not 
stir  and  touch  us,  the  sight  of  Jesus  on  a  second  cross  would 
fail  likewise. 

An  objection  is  sometimes  made  to  Christian  missions — 
you,  I  am  sure,  do  not  make  it,  and  it  is  disappearing,  though 
it  has  not  yet  disappeared— that  missions  to  the  heathen 
are  premature,  while  so  much  of  the  Church's  work  at  home 
remains  almost  hopelessly  unfulfilled.  No  words  of  mine 
can  be  needed  to  wither  in  a  sentence  an  objection  at  once 
so  silly  and  so  base.  So  base,  because  what  it  really  means 
is,  that  the  neglect  of  our  duty  at  home  justifies  the  neglect 
of  our  duty  abroad,  and  that  the  consciousness  of  our  sin 


12 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


ill  the  past  is  to  perpetuate  it  in  the  future.^  So  silly, 
for  as  the  Church  history  of  the  last  century  shows  us,  the 
awakening  of  the  Church's  conscience  as  to  her  duties  with 
the  heathen  abroad  has  a  distinct  reciprocal  effect  in  the 
stirring  of  home  effort  among  the  masses  in  England.  This 
century  of  evangelistic  effort  abroad  has  also  been  the 
century  of  stirred  Church  sympathy,  quickened  devotion, 
expanded  organization,  deepened  reverence,  national  edu- 
cation, multiplied  churches,  almost  recreated  diocesan  life. 
The  English  Church,  in  this  year  of  grace  1887,  is  something 
so  amazingly  different  in  its  methods,  activities,  and  devotion 
from  the  Church  of  1787,  that  the  best  way  of  explaining  it 
is  that  God  has  given  us  a  second  Pentecost.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  too,  those  who  aid  missionary  enterprise  abroad  are 
the  same  men  who  push  missionary  effort  at  home,  while  it 
only  too  often  happens  that  those  who  deprecate  foreign 
missions  in  the  interest  of  home  activities  are  admirably 
impartial  in  aiding  neither. 

Have  you,  however,  a  misgiving  that  the  people  do  not 
much  care  for  the  gospel ;  that  they  would  greatly  prefer 
to  be  left  as  they  are,  with  their  ancient  idolatries,  their 
pleasant  vices,  and  their  earthly  life  ?  ^  Do  you  remind  me, 
that  when  the  man  of  Macedonia  appeared  to  our  apostle  in 
a  vision,  asking  him  to  come  over  and  help  him,  when  he 
went  he  had  not  much  of  a  welcome  ?  At  Philippi  they 
threw  him  into  prison,  Thessalonica  he  had  to  leave  by 
night  to  avoid  violence,  Athens  met  him  with  polite  scorn  ? 
Ah  !  but  you  have  not  got  the  true  key  to  that  vision.  That 
man  of  Macedonia  represented  the  heathen  of  Europe  as 
they  were  present  to  the  mind  and  heart  of  God.   He  knew 

»  See  Bishop  Phillips  Brooks'  "  The  Candle  of  the  Lord,"  p.  167. 
^  Ibid.,  p.  94. 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


13 


the  capacities  and  possibilities  in  them.  He  saw  the  moral 
faculties  sleeping  there,  but  ready  to  be  aroused  at  the 
sound  of  His  Son's  gospel.  He  knew  His  own  purpose 
about  them,  and  the  opportunities  He  was  preparing  for 
them — the  depth  of  His  own  love,  and  the  power  of  the 
Spirit  He  would  bestow.  The  end  of  it  all  was  that  Europe 
was  won  to  the  Cross,  of  which  you  and  I  here  are  some  of 
the  results.  What  He  did  then.  He  will  do  now.  What 
man  was  then,  he  is  now.  The  gospel  is  the  same,  and 
we  are  not  to  be  ashamed  of  it,  "  for  it  is  the  power  of 
God  unto  salvation."  Sin  is  the  same — in  its  misery,  de- 
gradation, and  bondage  ;  and  the  only  deliverance  from  it  is 
in  welcoming  the  yoke  of  Christ,  to  be  Master  and  Saviour 
of  the  scul. 

Lastly,  the  objection  scorned  and  the  misgiving  re- 
moved, there  is  the  duty.  Shame  on  the  Church,  that  it 
should  still  be  the  duty  !  Blessing  for  us,  if  we  will  trans- 
form, through  grateful  love,  this  plain  duty  into  a  happy 
joy  !  My  brethren,  I  want  to  send  every  one  of  you  home 
to-day,  myself  as  the  rest,  with  this  thought,  murmuring 
restlessly  in  your  heart,  "  How  much  owe  I  unto  my 
Lord  ?  "    'a  am  debtor." 

At  the  beginning  of  another  century  of  Church  life,  I 
want  you  to  get  a  new  insight  into  Christ's  love,  a  fresh 
discoveiy  of  your  own  mercies,  a  more  eager  purpose  to 
.  use  the  opportunities  that  still  remain. 

If  we  only  rightly  understand  it,  we  shall  see  that  what  wc 
call  the  missionary  spirit  is  but  an  essential  and  indispen- 
sable feature  of  the  regenerate  life.  We  have  been  saved 
that  we  may  save ;  taught,  that  we  may  teach  ;  blessed,  that 
we  may  share  our  blessings ;  consoled,  that  we  may  go  to 
the  mourner  and  with  gentle  hand  wipe  away  his  tears. 


14 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS. 


Be^dn  at  home,  with  truth,  example,  and  charity.  Beware 
of  Pharisaism;  also  beware  of  uselessness.  Where  you 
cannot  speak,  you  can  pray.  And  the  perfectly  cogent 
argument  is  the  persistence  of  love.  Then,  as  the  circles  of 
your  sympathy  expand,  so  will  your  opportunities.  You 
will  see  many,  which  you  do  not  even  suspect  now ;  and  to 
see,  will  be  to  use.  And  be  sure,  each  of  you — pardon  me 
if  I  am  overbold  with  you — to  take  some  share  in  the 
missionary  work  of  the  Church. 

In  your  common  daily  life,  in  the  discharge  of  your 
ordinary  duties,  when  cares  oppress  you  or  friends  leave 
you,  when  your  sky  darkens  or  infirmity  makes  you  sad,  ever 
try  to  learn  the  wonderful  secret  of  abiding  peace,  in  a 
stirred  and  grateful  numbering  of  your  mercies.  The  way 
to  win  joy  is  to  make  sacrifices  ;  and  if  ever  you  are  tempted 
to  think,  as  we  all  are  occasionally,  that  you  are  forgotten 
and  others  remembered,  say  to  yourselves  our  apostle's 
sentence,  "  I  am  debtor,"  and  the  sense  of  indebtedness 
will  bring  back  the  glow  of  love. 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


"  The  first  necessity  of  religion  is  that  it  should  bo  religious." 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


Preached  in  Cuddesdon  Parish  Church,  June  14,  1892. 

*'  Wherefore,  O  king  Agrippa,  I  was  not  disobedient  unto  the 
lieavenly  vision." — Acts  xxvi.  19. 

If  the  key  to  the  importance  of  an  event  is  the  result  that 
comes  from  it,  the  measure  of  the  value  of  a  life  is  its 
influence  when  it  is  done.  If  the  middle-aged  live  in  the 
present,  and  are  apt  to  be  absorbed  in  it ;  if  the  old  live 
in  the  past,  and,  as  the  case  may  be,  either  reproach 
themselves  unreasonably  for  what  they  could  not  help,  or 
unduly  glorify  themselves  for  what  would  equally  have 
happened  without  them,  the  young  live  in  the  future,  and 
if  they  act  as  well  as  dream,  dig  in  the  earth  as  well  as 
build  in  the  air,  who  shall  justly  blame  them?  Imagination, 
with  all  its  admitted  perils,  has  a  distinct  and  reasonable 
influence  on  human  conduct.  "We  are  saved  by  hope." 
"  We  look  not  at  the  things  which  are  seen,  but  at  the 
things  which  are  not  seen."  By  the  visions  of  faith,  and  the 
diffidence  that  grows  out  of  experience,  and  the  sense  of 
capacity,  and  the  grace  of  God,  we  feel  our  way,  and  see 
our  duty,  and  fill  our  place,  and  perfect  our  life.  In  the 
passage  before  us,  the  apostle  tells  Agrippa  that  he  had 
not  been  disobedient  to  his  heavenly  vision.    Agrippa,  if 


1 8  THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 

he  was  listening,  may  have  felt  puzzled.  We,  at  the  end 
of  eighteen  centuries,  observing  that  that  heavenly  vision 
has  transformed  the  face  of  the  world,  and  that  the  king's 
name  survives  only  because  for  a  brief  hour  it  came  into 
contact  with  that  of  Saul  of  Tarsus,  are  better  able  to 
measure  the  value  of  the  obedience,  and  of  the  vision  to 
which  it  was  rendered ;  may  also  have  come  to  see  that 
in  a  very  real  and  lofty  sense  every  true  son  of  God,  and 
every  commissioned  herald  of  His  gospel,  will  have 
heavenly  visions  of  some  kind,  though  not  by  dreams  or 
trances;  that  each  will  have  his  own,  answering  to  his 
gifts  and  capacities ;  and  that  they  will  come  when  they 
are  wanted.  On  these  visions,  and  what  they  mean  for 
us,  I  wish  to  speak  to  you  this  morning. 

Our  visions,  among  other  things  they  do  for  us,  test 
and  measure,  and  in  a  sense  prepare  us  for  a  life  in  which, 
like  St.  Paul,  He  who  counts  us  worthy  of  it — while  He 
is  even  quick  to  dispel  the  visions  that  are  of  earth  and 
self — will  little  by  little,  and  very  gently,  unfold  to  us 
what  great  things  we  must  suffer,  and  perhaps  do,  for 
His  name's  sake.  It  is  a  poor  and  tame  soul  that  has 
no  visions.  It  is  a  shallow  and  ill-balanced  one  that  is 
for  long  unsteadied  by  them.  There  are  many  of  them, 
and  of  differing  value ;  and  they  open  out  one  by  one  in 
the  vistas  of  the  gathering  years  before  the  Hstening  con- 
science of  the  dutiful  servant.  If  they  have  not  begun 
for  us  yet,  we  are  not  fit  for  duty ;  if  they  are  all  over  for 
us,  our  duty  is  finished.  Yet  of  all  of  us,  be  we  only  true 
men,  it  may  be  said  that  we  stand  between  two  visions 
— one  behind,  and  one  in  front;  one  which  has  come  to 
us,  one  which  is  sure  to  come, — the  vision  of  the  Personal 
Christ,  who,  v/e  humbly  trust,  has  chosen  and  called  us, 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


19 


lhat  we  should  labour  with  Him  for  the  salvation  of  the 
world;  the  other,  the  tremendous  vision  of  judgment, 
when  the  task  to  which  we  have  given  ourselves  is  over, 
the  opportunities  gone,  the  past  irrevocable,  the  record 
filled,  the  eternity  made;  when  the  sheep  and  lambs  of 
Christ,  over  whom  in  His  mercy  He  made  us  overseers, 
and  about  whom  He  will  ask  us,  "  Where  is  the  flock  that 
was  given  thee,  thy  beautiful  flock?"  will  all  have  passed 
within  the  veil  to  see  God,  and  to  find  themselves,  and 
to  give  their  account  of  us. 

Of  the  four  great  visions  which  more  or  less  seize  the 
imagination  and  fire  the  heart  of  Christ's  ministers,  ^frj-/, 
surely,  comes  the  vision  which  summons  us  to  be  the  living 
voice  of  the  divine  oracles,  the  ministers  of  reconciliation 
between  God  and  men.  This  was  A^z/^/^'^  vision.  "I  heard 
the  voice  of  the  Lord,  saying.  Whom  shall  I  send,  and 
who  will  go  for  us  ?  Then  said^  I,  Here  am  I ;  send  me." 
AVho  can  exaggerate  the  solemnity  of  this  call,  or  the  issues 
that  hang  on  it,  or  the  blessedness  of  being  faithful  to  it, 
or  the  misery  of  some  day  repenting  that  it  had  ever  been 
made  ?  I  suppose  the  soundest  condition  of  heart  is  that 
which,  like  Isaiah's,  while  it  is  abashed  by  the  loftiness  of 
the  service,  shrinks  yet  more  from  the  baseness  of  refusing 
it  because  it  is  lofty — in  the  end,  fired  with  the  joy  of 
salvation,  quite  surrenders  itself  to  Christ. 

Our  second  vision — it  recurs  again  and  again — is  the 
vision  that  sends  us.  It  points  us  to  the  place  where  we 
are  to  labour,  and  to  the  people  whom  we  are  to  serve,  and 
to  the  fellows  with  whom  our  work  is  to  be  done,  and  it 
may  be  to  the  fathers  and  elders  who  are  to  train  us  in 
doing  it.  This  vision  touches  at  once  the  wisdom  and  the 
righteousness  of  God,  the  fruitfuiness  and  faithfulness  of 


20 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


men.  St.  Paul  is  our  pattern  here.  "  After  they  were 
come  to  Mysia,  they  assayed  to  go  into  Bithynia  :  but  the 
Spirit  suffered  them  not.  And  they  passing  by  Mysia  came 
down  to  Troas.  And  a  vision  appeared  to  Paul  in  the 
night;  There  stood  a  man  of  Macedonia,  and  prayed  him, 
saying,  Come  over  into  Macedonia,  and  help  us.  And 
after  he  had  seen  the  vision,  immediately  we  endeavoured 
to  go  into  Macedonia,  assuredly  gathering  that  the  Lord 
had  called  us  for  to  preach  the  gospel  unto  them."  This 
second  vision  is  not,  indeed,  to  supersede  the  usual  methods 
of  what  we  call  Providence,  so  much  as  to  provoke  our 
dutiful  attention  to  them.  Instead  of  bidding  us  abdicate 
our  faculties  of  conscience  and  reason,  it  honourably  recog- 
nizes them  by  compelling  their  exercise.  To  be  invited 
to  any  duty  does  not  necessarily  imply  that  we  are  to  accept 
it ;  simply  that  we  are  to  be  at  the  pains  of  thinking  about 
it.  Eagerness  has  its  risks  as  well  as  supineness,  and  im- 
petuousness  as  much  as  a  chilled  heart.  Among  the  servants 
of  Christ  there  will  always  be  at  least  two  classes, — the  men 
who  instantly  obey  duty,  and  the  men  who  instinctively 
consult  inclination  ;  the  men  who  at  once  turn  to  God  and 
say,  "What  wilt  Thou  have  me  to  do?" — the  men  whose 
one  anxiety  is  to  discover  what  is  pleasantest.  We  must 
not,  indeed,  say  that  inclination  is  always  to  be  sternly  re- 
pressed, as  if  it  were  in  no  sense  an  indication  of  our  fitness 
for  a  duty.  To  be  attracted  to  duty  is  to  be  far  on  the  road 
for  doing  it.  Certainly,  however,  it  must  be  listened  to  with 
reserve,  and  cross-examined  with  severity.  Also  it  is  true 
that  the  beautiful  enthusiasm  which  rushes  to  identify  the 
invitation  of  man  with  the  summons  of  God  must  not  too 
lightly  claim  our  apostle  as  an  authority.  It  presents  the 
heroic  side  of  life — and  we  need  to  have  it  presented,  or 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


21 


heroes  would  soon  become  extinct ;  but  sometimes  it  creates 
woeful  reactions  for  itself,  and  so  Mark  goes  back  to 
Jerusalem,  and  Demas  forsakes  St.  Paul.  It  is  our  duty 
to  think  as  well  as  our  glory  to  love.  Nevertheless  it  is  a 
poor  and  almost  sordid  nature  that  calculates  too  nicely, 
and  claims  too  rigorously  to  see  the  conclusion  of  its  choice. 
An  apostle  suffered  the  loss  of  all  things,  and  counted  them 
but  dung,  that  he  might  win  Christ.  It  has  been  finely  said 
by  one  at  whose  feet  some  of  you  in  past  Oxford  days  may 
have  rejoiced  to  sit,  "  Venture  is  an  element  in  most  things 
that  are  worth  doing,  and  is  a  condition  of  all  spiritual 
progress."^  "Slackness  for  good"  is  one  of  the  perils  of 
our  time ;  and  there  is  a  baseness  of  soul  in  it.  Do  you 
remember  what  Dean  Church  says  of  Sordello  ?  "  If  the 
good  had  come  to  him  of  itself,  he  would  gladly  have  taken 
it.  But  he  had  not  the  will  to  imagine  it,  to  seek  it ;  and 
so  his  noble  and  beautiful  nature,  with  all  its  grand  possi- 
biHties,  sank  into  uselessness  and  forgetfulness,  placed 
among  those  who  had  great  opportunities  and  great  thoughts, 
— the  men  of  great  chances  and  great  failures." 

The  third  vision  comes  to  deepen,  widen,  expand, 
mature  us,  turning  youth  into  manhood,  and  summoning 
us  to  the  midsummer  of  life.  It  was  St.  Peter's  at  Joppa. 
The  vessel  descending  out  of  heaven  with  all  manner  of 
fourfooted  beasts,  and  the  accompanying  voice,  *'  Rise, 
Peter,  kill  and  eat,"  and  the  significant  monition,  "  What 
God  hath  cleansed,  that  call  not  thou  common,"  had  set 
the  apostle  thinking  and  wondering,  when  suddenly  the 
messengers  of  Cornelius  stood  at  his  door,  and  the  Spirit 
saith  unto  him,  "  Behold,  three  men  seek  thee."  That  vision, 
as  we  know,  with  all  that  came  out  of  it,  meant  the  im- 
'  Dean  Paget. 


22 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


mediate  opening  of  the  Gentile  world  to  Christ.  It  was 
also  a  new  era  of  idea,  of  duty,  of  conquest  for  the  apostle. 
The  struggle  it  must  have  meant  for  a  conscientious  Hebrew 
Christian  it  is  very  hard  for  us  adequately  to  measure.  But 
growth  with  pain  is  the  very  principle  of  life ;  pain  not  only 
of  body,  but  of  soul — not  only  of  soul,  but  of  mind.  You 
whom  I  would  for  a  moment  address,  the  younger  among 
us — if  you  are  at  all  like  what  we  your  fathers  were — nay, 
let  me  add,  if  you  are  what  those  who  truly  care  for  you 
sincerely  wish  you  to  be — will  be  ardent  in  your  ideas, 
tenacious  of  your  articles  of  faith,  resentful  of  divergencies 
from '  your  personal  standpoint  of  conviction,  as  if  they 
implied  a  sort  of  injustice  or  disrespect.  But  you  have  yet 
to  discover,  as  we  in  front  of  you  are  continually  discovering, 
that  we  can  never  here  know  more  than  a  mere  fragment 
of  truth,  and  that  imperfectly ;  that  the  more  you  attain  of 
real  knowledge,  the  more  dissatisfied  you  will  be  with  it ; 
and  that  the  secret  of  a  kindly  toleration  of  the  errors  of 
others,  is  the  consciousness  of  needing  it  for  your  own. 
Well,  to  you  who  are  coming  up  so  rapidly  after  us,  who 
will  fill  our  places,  and  take  our  honours,  and  occupy  our 
chairs,  and  perhaps  improve  our  methods,  when  we  are 
gone  and  out  of  mind — whom  we  watch  with  no  austerity, 
and  love  with  no  grudged  affection — epochs  will  soon 
come,  may  even  be  coming  now,  when,  if  you  are  honest 
and  fresh-minded,  and  greatly  in  love  with  truth,  windows 
will  be  opened  in  your  souls,  through  which  will  stream 
visions  of  truth,  and  duty,  and  sacrifice,  and  enterprise, 
hidden  from  you  now,  as  the  summit  of  some  lofty  alp  from 
children  in  their  games  in  the  valley.  Your  spirit  may  have 
a  sore  travail-time,  but  you  will  pass  through  it  into  a 
higher  region,  and  life  will  henceforth  seem  made  new  for 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


23 


you.  Men  whom  once  you  could  hardly  think  of  kindly  will 
have  a  new  preciousness  in  your  eyes ;  and  the  austere, 
perhaps  unconscious,  disdain  which  once  shut  you  off  from 
them,  as  with  a  sort  of  frozen  winding-sheet,  will  be  softened 
by  the  discovery  that  they  too  are  the  sons  of  God,  perhaps 
nearer  His  face  than  yourselves.  Truths  which  once  had 
no  meaning  for  you  will  slowly  open  out  their  beauty ; 
events  which  had  no  significance  for  you  will  sparkle  and 
glitter  with  a  new  brightness.  You  will  not  have  thrown 
away  the  past.  It  is  still  yours,  to  be  for  ever  yours.  But 
you  will  have  added  to  it ;  for  God  has  spoken,  and  that  is 
enough.  It  is  a  tremendous  moment  when  it  comes,  for 
often  it  changes  all  the  life,  and  always  raises  us  to  a  new 
level  of  thought  and  joy  and  service. 

For  truth  is  something  to  be  passed  on.  The  souls  we 
have  to  reach  and  win  for  Christ  are  of  all  sorts  and  con- 
ditions :  the  ignorant  who  know  their  ignorance,  and  are 
content  with  it;  the  ignorant  who  do  not  know  their 
ignorance,  and  who  mistake  it  for  knowledge  ;  the  lettered, 
and  pleasure-seeking,  and  careless,  who  live  in  quite 
another  world  to  ours,  and  who,  if  they  ever  step  across 
into  ours,  quickly  go  back  with  a  sort  of  amused  disdain. 
We  have  to  deal  with  an  infinite  variety  of  character,  and 
occupation,  and  opportunity,  and  environment, — all  factors 
in  the  ever-maturing  process  of  the  final  destiny ;  all  more 
or  less  assimilating  and  transfusing  into  their  own  invisible 
life  what  comes  to  them  from  these  lives  and  Hps  of  ours. 
Well  might  the  wise  man  say,  "  He  that  winneth  souls  is 
wise."  W^ell  might  Jesus  say,  that  the  secret  of  winning 
them  can  only  be  learnt  in  following  Him.  Well,  too,  may 
all  of  us  remember  that  the  compensation  for  His  absence, 
the  promise  of  His  Father,  the  secret  of  all  our  power,  is 


24 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


in  the  gifts  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  For,  as  a  great  American 
preacher  has  observed,  the  two  instruments  with  which  we 
have  to  win  them — or,  to  change  the  figure,  the  two  spheres 
which  we  must  persuade  them  to  enter — are  truth  and  love. 
They  must  be  both  together,  for  they  are  incomplete  apart. 
There  is  but  small  profit  in  giving  them  truth,  if  they  do 
not  feel  that  you  give  it  them  because  you  love  them. 
There  is  still  less  use  in  loving  them,  if  you  only  stir  their 
emotions,  and  keep  back  those  great  verities  by  which  men 
live,  and  see,  and  receive,  and  enjoy  God,  and  which,  as 
the  Church's  witnesses  and  servants,  you  are  to  sow  in  their 
hearts  unto  eternal  life. 

The  fourth  vision  is  the  vision  which  inspires.  It  was 
St  John's.  "  After  this  I  beheld,  and,  lo,  a  great  multitude, 
which  no  man  could  number,  of  all  nations,  and  kindreds, 
and  people,  and  tongues,  stood  before  the  throne,  and 
before  the  Lamb,  clothed  with  white  robes,  and  palms  in 
their  hands."  This  vision  sustains  because  it  inspires,  for 
it  makes  us  hope  about  our  work  when  we  are  gone.  "  One 
soweth,  and  another  reapeth."  Some  of  you  whom  I  am 
addressing  may  not  need  it  now — you  may  not  need  it  for 
years  to  come ;  but  sooner  or  later,  if  you  are  true,  and 
your  hearts  alive  for  your  Lord's  glory,  and  you  have  the 
reward  of  disappointment,  and  hope  deferred  makes  your 
heart  sick  (and  would  you  wish  not  to  be  disappointed,  and 
to  take  defeat  easily,  and  to  see  your  flock  wandering,  and 
not  to  care  ?),  the  tempter  will  tempt  you ;  and  it  will  be 
despondency,  not  presumption,  that  he  will  suggest;  and 
perhaps  it  may  not  be  till  quite  middle  life,  when  the  old 
buoyancy  is  ebbing,  that  the  question  will  come,  *'  Is  my 
gospel  true ;  is  my  Lord  faithful ;  is  my  life  fruitful ;  is  my 
ministry  a  power?  "    The  hands  of  the  strongest  will  some- 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


25 


times  hang  down,  and  the  knees  of  the  swift  wax  feeble. 
The  greatest  of  the  Old  Testament  prophets  asked,  "  Who 
hath  believed  our  report  ?  "  The  greatest  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment prophets  sent  to  inquire  of  Christ,  "Art  Thou  He 
that  should  come,  or  do  we  look  for  another?"  To'St.  Paul 
himself  came  once  a  dark  hour,  when  his  only  solace  was 
prayer,  his  only  consolation  the  sufficient  grace  of  God. 

Brethren,  be  sure,  and  do  not  fear  to  be  assured,  that  to 
you,  to  me,  to  us  all,  there  may  come,  nay,  if  we'  travail  for 
souls,  and  have  our  Lord's  kingdom  at  heart,  and  lament 
our  own  weakness,  and  deeply  feel  how  personal  unworthi- 
ness  limits  the  activities  of  God,  there  will  come  clouds  and 
darkness,  shadows  and  gloominess,  and  they  will  sorely  try 
you ;  and  that  is  just  what  they  are  meant  for,  and  presently 
they  will  pass.  But  may  I  tell  you  how  to  help  them  to 
pass  ?  "  They  that  sow  in  tears  shall  reap  in  joy."  There 
can  be,  here  at  least,  no  joy  without  tears — the  right 
tears ;  but  a  good  many  tears  will  be  well  and  everlastingly 
recompensed  by  the  first  glimpse  of  the  King  in  His 
beauty.  All  true  work  shall  have  its  reward,  by  the  self- 
acting  laws  of  the  heavenly  kingdom,  though  we  must  be 
content  to  wait  for  it.  Root  it,  however^  deeply  into  your 
hearts,  that  no  prayer,  or  truth,  or  sacrifice,  or  charity,  or 
smile  on  a  little  child,  or  a  cup  of  cold  water  to  a  lonely 
heart,  or  a  joy  surrendered,  or  a  hope  quenched,  shall 
miss  its  just,  its  inevitable,  its  magnificent  recompense. 
"  Every  man  shall  receive  his  own  reward,  according  to 
his  own  labour."  Some  of  it  we  have  even  here  and  now, 
and  we  know  it.  The  best  shall  be  revealed  at  the  coming 
of  the  King. 

Three  last  thoughts  let  me  press  on  you,  conscious  of 
my  tediousness  and  ashamed  about  it. 


26 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


I.  Let  us  each  be  ourselves.  Let  us  grasp,  accentuate, 
develop  our  own  personality;  expect,  receive,  and  follow 
our  own  vision  from  on  high.  Let  us  have  our  own  scheme 
of  life,  our  own  methods  of  duty,  our  own  ideals  of  good- 
ness, our  own  devotion  to  Christ,  premising  only  that  they 
are  generous,  practicable,  and  complete.  The  holy  angels 
are  all  around  us  to-day,  our  hearts  are  full  of  tender 
sympathy  with  each  other,  and  sympathy  means  inter- 
cession. He  who  walks  among  the  seven  golden  candle- 
sticks, and  who  holds  the  seven  stars  in  His  right  hand, 
and  who  meets  you  to-day  in  this  holy  place,  consecrated 
by  so  many  blessed  associations,  endeared  by  so  many 
tender  memories,  waits  to  fill  you  with  the  love  that  passeth 
knowledge.  We  cannot  measure  the  honour  of  serving 
Him,  or  the  bliss  of  seeing  Him,  when  life  is  done.  He 
asks  each  of  us  again,  ''Lovest  thou  Me?  "  He  bids  each 
of  us  again,    Feed  My  sheep,  feed  My  lambs." 

Again,  by  three  things  shall  we  see  God,  and  be  capable 
of  apprehending  the  heavenly  vision,  and  so  serve  Him. 
They  are  the  best  things  on  earth.  Oh  that  we  were  at 
more  pains  to  understand  their  blessedness !  They  are 
worship,  truth,  and  character.  These  are  the  greatest  forces 
under  the  sun,  and  the  mightiest  blessings.  They  are  ours, 
as  much  as  we  care  to  make  them  so,  whether  for  use  or  for 
duty.  We  know  that  it  is  so ;  and  to  know  it,  awes  the 
heart  as  well  as  thrills  it.  Let  us  bring  the  awe  and  the 
joy  as  our  offering  to  Him  to-day. 

Lastly,  let  us  look  forward  and  upward,  and  greatly 
hope,  because  we  have  a  divine  commission  from  a  divine 
Master,  to  a  divine  society  and  for  a  divine  end.  We  are 
part  of  a  vast  and  mighty  procession,  of  which  the  beginning 
and  the  end  are  out  of  sight,  on  our  solemn  and  separate 


THE  OBEDIENCE  OF  FAITH. 


27 


way  to  the  city  of  God.  We  are  not  alone :  on  the  right 
and  on  the  left,  behind  us  and  in  front  of  us,  visible  and 
invisible,  humble  and  faithful  souls  swell  our  ranks  and 
chant  our  triumph.  We  think  tenderly  and  thankfully 
to-day,  among  others,  of  Samuel  Wilberforce  and  John 
Mackarness,  Henry  Liddon  and  James  Denison — names 
ever  to  be  venerated  in  this  place,  and  ever  loved,  who  have 
finished  their  course,  and,  we  humbly  trust,  have  received 
their  welcome,  and  they  rest  from  their  labours. 

Their  visions  are  over ;  ours  are  not  yet  over.  May 
they  never  cease  to  be  over  until  the  conflict  is  over  and 
our  work  done.  Then  the  visions  of  this  present  time, 
whicli  is  but  for  a  moment,  shall  be  exchanged  for  the 
glorious  joy  unspeakable  and  full  of  glory. 

"  Ever  the  richest,  tenderest  glow 
Sets  round  the  autumnal  sun  ; 
But  then  sight  fails  :  no  heart  may  know 
The  bliss  when  life  is  done.'' 


DISCIPLINE. 


"  Character  precedes  power." 


DISCIPLINE, 


Preached  in  St,  PatiCs  Cathedral^  February  27,  1887. 

"And  he  took  the  fire  in  his  hand,  and  a  knife  ;  and  they  went  both 
of  them  together." — Gen.  xxii.  6. 

Old  Testament  history  gives  us  more  than  one  glimpse  of 
a  pair  of  kindred  souls,  walking  side  by  side  on  a  journey 
with  vast  issues,  knowing  that  they  must  soon  say  farewell, 
and  dreading  unspeakably  the  moment  of  saying  it;  the 
one  to  be  taken,  and  the  other  left.  Moses  and  Aaron 
go  up  Mount  Hon  The  elder  brother  is  to  die  there, 
and  there  is  a  penalty  in  his  dying.  The  younger  and  the 
greater  is  to  strip  him  of  his  high  priest's  garment,  and 
to  put  it  on  Eleazar  his  son,  and  then  to  watch  him  die ; 
and  to  go  down  the  mountain  without  him,  soon  to  be  laid 
in  a  lonely  grave  of  his  own.  Two  prophets  stand  together 
by  Jordan.  The  elder  has  striven  in  vain  to  be  alone  in 
his  last  moments ;  the  younger,  divining  what  he  must 
presently  lose,  will  see  the  last  of  his  master  Elijah,  and 
so  catches  on  his  own  eager  and  yet  reverent  spirit  the 
glow  of  the  heavenly  fire  in  which  the  mighty  prophet 
passes  up  to  God.  Here  j-re  father^  and_son.  The  father 
is  he  in  whom  all  the  families  of  the  earth  are  to  be 
blessed.  The  son  is  the  child  of  promise,  so  long  waited 
for,  welcomed  with  such  passionate  delight.     They  are 


32 


DISCIPLINE. 


walking  side  by  side,  and  the  mystery  of  an  awful 
secret  divides  them.  My  friends,  was  there  ever  journey 
like  that  journey ;  ever  a  trial  like  that  which,  as  with  the 
piercing  of  a  sword,  searched  Abraham  ?  Saint  he  was,  but 
still  a  man ;  servant  of  God,  if  ever  there  was  one,  yet  at 
once  husband  and  father.  To  Sarah,  in  that  doubtless 
indivulged  errand,  he  must  have  been  tempted  to  feel 
guilty  of  a  great  treachery.  The  very  sight  of  the  son, 
who  so  absolutely  trusted  him  with  an  unsuspecting  love, 
and  happy  face,  and  buoyant  step,  under  that  cruel  load, 
must  have  stirred  in  his  heart  an  untold  anguish. 

Divines,  some  of  them  men  whose  writings  have  made 
an  epoch  in  theology,  have  loved  to  formulate  with  more 
or  less  acuteness  and  research  the  doctrinal  value  of  this 
pathetic  incident. 

Some  observe  in  it  the  striking  concurrence,  such  as 
never  could  happen  again,  of  the  recognized  absoluteness 
of  parental  authority,  the  ever-present  vivid  sense  of  the 
supernatural,  as  a  constant  reasonable  factor  in  human  affairs, 
and  of  the  supreme  majesty  of  the  divine  will  when  once 
distinctly  asserting  itself  over  every  other  consideration 
whatever,  whether  of  moral  law,  civil  enactment,  or  human 
love.  That  heroic  obedience  has  been  at  once  a  unique 
and  unparalleled  revelation  to  mankind  of  the  power  of 
faith  and  the  glory  of  sacrifice. 

One  thought  inspired  Abraham — he  was  doing  his  duty. 
One  principle  underlaid  his  life — the  absolute  sovereignty 
of  God.  One  assurance  supported  him — ''Shall  not  the 
Judge  of  all  the  earth  do  right?"  One  hope  kept  his 
heart  from  breaking — ''He  accounted  that  God  was  able 
to  raise  him  from  the  dead,  from  whence  also  he  received 
him  in  a  figure." 


DISCIPLINE.  33 

Others,  again,  have  seen  in  the  incident — what,  of 
course,  is  there — a  beautiful  though  imperfect  illustration  of 
that  great  atoning  sacrifice,  in  which  the  Father  sent  the 
Son  to  be  the  Saviour  of  the  world.  Imperfect,  however, 
for  our  Redeemer  clearly  foresaw  from  the  beginning  of 
His  ministry  the  death  which  was  to  meet  Him  at  the 
end;  imperfect  also,  for  Abraham  offered  Isaac  in  will, 
but  not  in  deed.  Our  Redeemer  not  only  approached  His 
cross,  but  died  on  it. 

To  some  of  us,  however,  it  may  perhaps  be  found  most 
instructive  as  a  very  real  and  solemn  parable  of  the  constant 
and  blessed  discipline  of  our  daily  human  life,  in  which, 
moment  by  moment,  each  separate  soul,  whether  conscious 
of  it  or  unconscious,  caring  for  it  or  not  caring,  is  being 
made  to  pass  through  the  crucible  of  inexorable  circum- 
stance, with  a  separate  life-plan  for  each  to  fulfil,  and  a 
divine  ideal  for  each  to  consummate,  constantly  and 
separately  encompassed  by  an  awful,  tender,  holy,  invisible 
Presence,  waiting  to  guide,  watching  to  comfort,  asking  to 
bless,  and  able  to  love. 

Let  me  proceed  to  expound  this  truth  a  little  more  fully, 
in  some  of  the  ideas  which  it  may  be  thought  to  contain. 

Every  soul  has  its  own  road  to  travel,  w^hich  no  one  else 
travels,  or  ever  can  traveTT  Occasionally  it  may  seem  to  be 
in  company  w^th  others ;  in  a  sense  it  is.  Often  it  is  solitary. 
Yet  never  quite  solitary;  for  ever  there  stan^TlT'its  side 
one  to  guide  and  to  strengthen :  and  his  form  is  like  the 
Son  of  God. 

Each  human  soul  is  on  its  way  to  its  own  Jerusalem,! 
and  that  Jerusalem  has  its  own  appointed  Moriah.  ^ 

On  each  of  us  God  lays  and  fastens,  as  Abraham  laid 
and  fastened  on  Isaac,  the  burden  of  our  future,  which, 


D— 15 


34 


DISCIPLINE. 


whatever  it  may  be,  and  for  as  long  as  He  bids  us,  we  must 
be  content  to  bean  We  cannot  change  it ;  it  would  be  a 
great  folly  to  wish  to  change  it.  We  may  not  drop  it ;  for 
in  carrying  it  is  at  once  the  fulfilment  of  our  destiny  and 
the  training  for  our  eternity. 

Our  character  and  our  circumstances  shape  its ,  carj;;er, 
develop  its  activities,  and  mature  its  capacity.  Each  man 
is  himself,  and  need  not  feebly  desire  to  be  any  other  man. 
God  has  His  own  thought  of  him,  and  will"  help  him  to 
accomplish  it. 

As  Abraham  walked  with  Isaac,  Christ  our  Lord  walks 
with  us.  But,  perhaps  most  solemn  thought  of  all,  in  His 
hand,  as  in  Abraham's  hand^  is  the  fire  and  the  knife  for 
the  burnt  offering.  We  remember  that  it  is  the  pierced 
hand,  and  we  know  it  will  be  gentle  with  us,  touched  by 
the  recollection  of  His  own  experience.  He  felt  the  fire, 
and  the  sharpness  of  the  knife.  In  all  our  afflictions  He 
is  afflicted.  He  lays  no  burden  on  us  that  He  has  not 
first  borne  Himself — He,  our  Prince  and  Saviour.  But  the 
fire  and  the  knife  mean  jpain ;  and  though  sometimes  the 
sacrifice  at  the  last  moment  is  spared  us,  as  Abraham  at 
the  last  moment  was  spared  the  awful  misery  of  slaying 
his  son — to  look  at  it,  and  come  up  to  it,  and  make  up 
our  mind  for  it,  is  to  drain  the  cup  of  half  of  its  bitter- 
ness. Nay,  after  having  once  steadily  faced  it,  we  never 
are  quite  the  same  afterwards. 

Again,  each  soul  is  continually  to  offer  itself  to  God — 
as  Isaac  offered  himself  to  Abraham — as  a  living  sacrifice, 
and  as  a  burnt  sacrifice;  not  for  expiation,  but  in  self- 
consecration  ;  not  to  pay  a  debt,  but  to  confess  it.  St. 
Paul  calls  it  our  "reasonable  service."  The  essence  of 
the  sacrifice,  and  the  secret  of  it,  is  in  the  will. 


DISCIPLINE. 


The  fire  and  the  knife  are  the  two  methods  of  the 
divine  discipline.  Sometimes  both  together,  sometimes 
apart,  sometimes  at  long  intervals ;  never  quite  done  with 
till  we  are  in  the  sinless  land.  The  fire  means,  through 
the  various  dispensations  and  ministries  of  grace,  the 
personal  dealing  of  God  the  Holy  Ghost  with  the  soul,  of 
whom  it  is  written  that  He  is  the  "  Spirit  of  burning," 
about  whom  it  was  promised  that  Christ  should  baptize 
with  the  Holy  Ghost  and  with  fire.  Every  one  shall 
be  salted  with  fire,"  said  Christ.  It  is  the  convincing, 
purifying,  searching,  self-revealing  work  of  God  on  the 
conscience  and  mind  and  heart,  often  very  humbling 
and  terrible  in  its  revelation  of  our  own  sinfulness  and 
the  Divine  Holiness — the  coming  near  to  us,  close  to  us, 
of  Him  who  is  expressly  described  as  a  consuming  fire; 
who  hereafter  is  to  burn  up  the  chaff  with  unquenchable 
fire;  who  even  now  is  trying  the  work  of  His  servants 
by  fire  to  see  of  what  sort  it  is ;  whose  "  eyes  arc  as  a 
flame  of  fire,  and  His  feet  like  unto  fine  brass,  as  if 
they  burned  in  a  furnace,"  and  of  whom  one  of  His 
own  sayings  is  reported,  "  He  that  is  near  Me,  is  near 
fire." 

The  knife  is  the  discipline  of  separation,  in  that  Divine 
Providence  which  rules  over  us  all.  "  If  thy  right  hand 
offend  thee,  cut  it  off,  and  cast  it  from  thee."  Sometimes,  if 
we  will  not  do  it  for  ourselves.  He  does  it  for  us.  Yet  it 
is  not  always  things  that  offend  that  are  thus  cast  away. 
There  are  hidden  reasons  for  many  of  God's  dealings  with 
.us,  about  which  an  honest  conscience  is  properly  slow  to 
accuse  itself,  and  about  which  the  mind,  admitting  that  it  is 
a  mystery,  waits  to  know  until  the  dawning  of  the  day. 
This  knife  of  God  cuts  off  many  things ;  as  life  goes  on, 


36 


DISCIPLINE. 


seems  busier  and  busier  with  its  work.  Health,  or  money, 
or  the  blessed  opportunity  of  usefulness,  or  a  life  which 
is  so  bound  up  with  our  own,  that  the  knife  which  severs 
one  thread,  half  cuts  through  the  other.  If  man's  dignity 
is  in  his  thinking,  his  greatness  is  in  his  loving.  The  noble 
penalty  of  loving  much,  is  suffering  much.  Not  to  mourn 
is  not  to  care. 

Once  more,  the  difference  between  one  man  and  another 
is,  not  that  one  man  has  his  burden  bound  on  his  back,  and 
another  man  has  no  burden.  Each  man  has  his  own  burden. 
Nor,  again,  that  one  man  has  a  divine  Friend  at  his  side  to 
care  for  him  and  discipHne  him,  and  another  man  has  no 
such  friend.    Christ  is  the  Saviour  of  the  world,  and  the 
Head  of  every  man.    Nor,  again,  is  it  true  that  for  one 
man  there  is  the  fire  and  the  knife  in  the  divine  hand,  and 
not  for  another.    Every  man  in  turn  feels  the  scorching  of 
the  fire,  and  shudders  at  the  glitter  of  the  knife  as  it  cuts 
him.  God  is  for  all,  and  therefore  all  suffer.  The  difference 
is,  that  some_^ee  their  Lord  at  their  side,  and  some  will  not 
see  Him — nay,  say  that  there  is  no  Lord  to  see.  Some 
accept  the  discipline  as  the  purpose  of  an  unspeakable  love, 
and  though  intensely  feeling  it,  and  honestly  wishing  it 
away,  welcome  it  for  what  it  means  j  say,  though  not 
instantly  or  easily,  ''The  cup  which  my  Father  hath  given 
me,  shall  I  not  drink  it  ?  " — manfully  suffer  themselves,  when 
the  time  comes  for  it,  to  watch  the  altar  building  on  which 
they  are  to  be  offered,  climb  it,  lay  down  on  it,  bound 
hand  and  foot,  saying,     Though  He  slay  me,  yet  will  I 
trust  in  Him;"  while  others  moan,  and  rebel,  and  struggle, 
and  refuse  to  recognize  the  love,  accept  the  discipline,  or 
obey  the  law,  or  trust  the  Saviour,  and  pushing  Christ  away 
from  them  as  of  old,  say,  "What  have  we  to  do  with  Thee^ 


DISCIPLINE. 


37 


Jesus,  Thou  Son  of  God  ?  art  Thou  come  hither  to  torment 
us  before  the  time  ?  " 

To  conclude.  St.  Paul,  in  his  letter  to  the  Galatians, 
gloried  in  the  marks  of  the  Lord  Jesus  "  on  his  flesh ; 
claimed  on  account  of  them,  and  as  a  kind  of  recognition 
of  them,  freedom,  respect,  and  consideration.  "  Henceforth 
let  no  man  trouble  me."  Every  real  life,  in  exact  proportion 
to  its  intenseness,  leaves  its  mark  both  on  body  and  soul. 
The  thinker,  the  soldier,  the  statesman,  the  priest,  some- 
times carry  their  profession  on  their  brow.  But  the  soul 
has  its  marks  too,  which  we  shall  recognize  and  admire 
in  eternity.  The  Lamb  as  it  had  been  slain "  will  be 
adored  by  the  countless  multitudes  for  whom  He  was 
slain ;  those  who  have  come  out  of  great  tribulation  shall 
have  their  marks  as  well.  My  brethren,  have  not  you  some- 
times felt  conscious,  when  some  great  trial  was  trying  and 
purging  your  inmost  soul,  of  a  closer  and  more  direct 
presence  of  your  Lord,  and  of  a  sort  of  new  dignity,  and 
independence,  and  courage,  and  supremacy  coming  out  of 
it  ?  You  may  often  read  it  in  a  man's  face,  if  you  know 
human  nature.  The  littleness  of  these  material  things, 
the  greater  nearness  to  the  unseen  world,  and  the  ex- 
cellence of  glory  which  fills  it,  and  the  fellowship  of  the 
saints  who  worship  in  it,  and  the  nearness  of  the  King 
who  rules  it,  are  among  the  real  alleviations  of  even  the 
greatest  sorrow.  "  Death  is  but  an  event  in  life  ; "  and  as 
we  see  how  calmly  it  is  approached,  how  entirely  it  is 
conquered,  even  in  the  moment  when  it  seems  to  be  most 
supreme,  the  penalty  of  sin  seems  to  disappear — it  has 
become  but  the  going  out  of  one  room  in  our  Father's 
house  into  another.  Christ's  own  word  comes  back  to  us 
with  an  untold  force  and  consolation — "Verily,  verily,  I 


38 


DISCIPLINE. 


say  unto  you,  He  that  keepeth  My  word  shall  not  see 
death."  If  only  the  marks  of  the  fire  and  the  knife  are  on 
us,  and  we  wear  the  scars  of  our  discipline,  we  claim  our 
reward.   Henceforth  let  no  man  trouble  us  ;  we  will  be  free. 

Another  lesson  taught  us,  at  least  incidentally,  from  this 
passage,  fully  and  solemnly  all  through  the  Old  Testament 
Scriptures,  is  that  God  cannot  pass  over  sin ;  that  He  can 
by  no  means  clear  the  guilty,  i.e.  the  impenitent  guilty  ; 
and  that  though  His  Son's  cross  has  expiated  its  penalty, 
our  own  sorrow,  suffused  with  His  grace,  must  be  the 
healing  discipline  of  the  soul.  The  fire  and  the  knife  must 
do  their  joint  duty  on  us.  He  did  not  love  the  world  less 
before  that  cross  was  reared ;  He  does  not  claim  holiness 
less  now  that  it  has  been  reared.  He  loves  to  pardon, 
and  tells  us  so,  and  we  need  not  fear  to  believe  it.  But 
the  repentance  which  is  in  the  will,  and  desires  the  pardon, 
must  not  be  permitted  to  usurp  the  place  of  that  penitence 
which  the  fire  and  the  knife  are  continually  to  produce  in 
us  till  the  end  of  our  days.  Because  God  loves  us  so 
much,  His  one  and  firm  purpose  is  to  deliver  us  from  the 
power  of  sin,  as  well  as  from  the  penalty  of  it,  and  this  must 
come  through  the  process  of  sorrow.  The  gospel  of  this 
time  is  never  more  shallow  and  facile  and  perilous  than 
when  it  proclaims  God  to  be  Love  at  the  expense  of  His 
righteousness,  or  forgets  to  explain  that  He  most  blessedly 
manifests  His  love  in  making  us,  even  at  much  personal 
cost,  partakers  of  His  holiness.  "No  chastening  for  the 
present  seemeth  to  be  joyous,  but  grievous,"  but  it  is  to 
bring  forth  the  peaceable  fruit  of  righteousness  unto  them 
which  are  exercised  thereby."  "  Be  ye  holy,  for  I  am  holy." 

Finally,  have  not  you  sometimes  observed — and  it  is 
often  a  painful  mystery,  to  which  the  fire  and  the  knife 


DISCIPLINE. 


39 


may  be  a  partial  key — that  the  closing  years  of  some 
of  God's  most  proved  and  faithful  servants  are  by  no 
means  what  we  should  have  expected  them  to  be,  calm  and 
bright  and  fruitful ;  that  the  poets  presage,  "  Ever  the 
richest,  tenderest  glow  sets  round  the  autumnal  sun,"  is 
not  always  verified ;  that  whether  it  be  broken  ideals,  or 
unfinished  plans,  or  interrupted  habits,  or  the  inevitable 
organic  decay,  or  friends  dying  all  around  and  leaving  them 
alone,  the  last  song  in  their  mouth  is  not  that  of  the  saint 
of  old,  "  Lord,  now  lettest  Thou  Thy  servant  depart  in 
peace,  for  mine  eyes  have  seen  Thy  salvation  "  ?  It  troubles 
us,  for  others  may  misunderstand  it,  who  may  not  see  as 
we  see  that  God  is  dealing  with  them,  and  showing  the 
things  He  has  not  shown  them,  before  they  pass  to  the 
brightness  of  His  face ;  also  it  alarms  us,  for  will  it  presently 
happen  to  ourselves  ? 

Brethren,  the  first  and  the  last  thing  is,  not  to  fear 
anything  either  for  ourselves  or  for  others,  but  always  to 
trust  God,  to  welcome  anything  and  everything  which  helps 
us  to  be  like  God.  If  the  fire  is  needed  to  purge  us,  let  it 
purge  us.  If  the  knife  is  needed  to  separate  us  from 
earthly  things,  let  it  separate  us.  We  know  whom  we  have 
believed.  Even  our  Lord  once  had  His  hour  of  darkness, 
and  His  sense  of  lonehness.  But  it  was  only  for  a  moment. 
Let  us  go  on  into  the  future  calmly  and  trustfully,  what- 
ever it  may  have  to  say  to  us,  knowing  that  it  can  only 
give  us  fuller  and  fuller  evidence  of  a  perfect  wisdom,  and 
of  a  love  which  passeth  knowledge. 

So  the  fire  and  the  knife  may  still  have  their  work  to  do 
on  us,  but  our  comfort  is.  When  we  are  tried,  we  shall 
come  forth  as  gold.  "  Who  shall  separate  us  from  the  love 
of  Christ  ?  " 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


"  I  do  only  one  thing  at  a  time,  and  I  do  it  with  all  my  might." 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


"Able  ministers  of  the  New  Testament." — 2  Cor.  iii.  6. 

Ministerial  efficiency  means  practical  capacity  for  ad- 
vancing the  kingdom  of  Christ.  We  recognize  several 
types  of  it,  which  seldom,  if  ever,  are  found  together  : 
and  the  standard,  which  both  defines  and  measures  it,  is 
observed  to  vary  from  age  to  age.  Here  it  may  be  added 
lliat,  while  in  special  functions  of  the  ministry  other 
religious  communions  distinctly  surpass  our  own  (in 
technical  training  we  are,  perhaps,  inferior  to  all),  it  is 
probable  that  an  English  clergyman  strikes  a  higher  average 
of  general  efficiency  than  any  other  minister  of  the  gospel. 
Bat  what  is  the  life,  and  what  the  character,  on  which 
this  efficiency  depends  ?  The  life  is  not  merely  the  hours 
spent  in  the  study,  the  school,  and  the  church,  but  the  sum- 
total  of  it  in  the  dear  sanctities  of  home,  in  the  helpful 
intercourse  of  society,  in  holidays,  and  in  rest.  By  character 
is  meant  that  indefinable  and  inevitable  tone  and  atmo- 
sphere of  moral  nature  which,  moment  by  moment,  un- 
consciously but  incessantly,  forms  itself  out  of  our  words, 
thoughts,  and  deeds;  according  to  the  awful  proverb  (as 
true  of  us  as  of  our  fellows) — 

"  Sow  the  act,  and  reap  the  habit ; 
Sow  the  habit,  and  reap  the  character ; 
Sow  the  character,  and  reap  the  eternity." 


44 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  was  in  the  habit  of  grounding  his 
canvas  with  a  thick  white  paint  before  he  drew  a  single  line 
of  his  portraits.  This  gave  luminousness  to  the  picture 
when  it  was  complete.  So  a  clergyman's  character  shines 
through  his  work  as  well  as  on  it ;  it  will  not  be  hid,  for  it 
cannot  be.  As  Monod  writes,  in  a  well-known  sermon  on 
St.  Paul,  For  him  the  apostle  is  simply  the  Christian 
authorized  by  God  to  live  for  nothing  else  but  to  com- 
municate his  Christianity  to  the  world ;  and  then,  for  the 
purpose  of  this  communication,  endowed  with  certain  super- 
natural powers,  which  are  a  grace  of  the  apostleship,  but 
neither  its  real  essence  nor  proper  strength.  In  a  few  lines 
he  gives  us  the  secret  of  his  life  as  an  apostle,  to  be  the 
secret  of  his  life  as  a  Christian." 

What  is  the  secret,  in  the  world  around  us,  of  efficiency 
of  any  kind,  whether  artistic,  literary,  scientific,  or  political  ? 
Is  it  not  to  be  found  in  the  combination,  more  or  less 
perfect,  of  will,  affections,  and  intelligence,  stirred  and  kept 
moving  by  the  impulse  of  conscience,  and  vitalized  by  the 
energy  of  faith?  The  will  first  resolves  on  action,  and 
then  perseveres  in  it.  The  affections,  if  they  do  not 
originate  the  .purpose,  intensify  it  by  giving  it  a  motive. 
The  intelligence  supplies  the  resources,  having  already  con- 
ceived the  ideas.  The  conscience  says,  "  Thou  must :  it 
is  thy  duty."  Faith  overcomes  all  obstacles  by  the  vivid 
anticipation  of  success. 

Now,  the  secret  of  overcoming  the  world  of  material 
things  is  also  the  secret  of  subduing  the  souls  of  men 
to  the  yoke  and  cross  of  Jesus  Christ.  We  too  must  will 
and  know,  love,  fear,  and  believe ;  and  if  we  first  consider 
what  are  the  prominent  functions  of  our  apostolic  ministry, 
and  then  inquire  what  special  moral  characteristics  are 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


45 


severally  needful  for  them,  we  may  find  the  proposition 
with  which  we  started  quietly  working  itself  out  like  an 
actual  demonstration ;  and  the  minister  of  Jesus  Christ  will 
be  seen  to  be  His  faithful  servant  just  in  proportion  as  he 
is  His  true  disciple.    Organization,  the  pastoral  function, 
public  worship,  preaching — these,  as  we  shall  all  agree, 
constitute  the  main  substance  of  the  ministry  committed 
to  us  over  the  souls  of  men ;  and  in  relation  to  each  one 
of  them  the  minister  will  be  efficient  only  so  far  as  he  is, 
first  of  all,  a  Christian  man.    No  one  will  either  organize 
or  administer  to  much  purpose  without  resolute  diligence  ; 
but  diligence  is  born  of  the  will :  and  the  pastoral  function 
will  never  be  even  a  possible  daily  task,  unless  the  con- 
science send  us  forth  day  by  day  to  tell  from  house  to 
house  that  vital  and  indispensable  story,  which  is  the 
revelation  and  channel  of  God  :  and  both  to  join  in  public 
worship,  as  well  as  to  lead  it,  there  must  be  devoutness, 
which  mCans  the  heart  burning :  and  our  message,  born 
from  a  grave  and  earnest  intelligence  that  has  first  seized 
and  apprehended  the  joy  of  it  before  declaring  it  to  others, 
nmst  be  our  very  best — no  mere  string  of  pious  remarks 
about  Christ,  but  the  full  and  bold  and  objective  setting 
forth  of  the  dignity  of  His  Person,  and  the  merits  of  His 
sacrifice,  and  the  sufficiency  of  His  righteousness,  and  the 
power  of  His  intercession  for  a  lost  race — the  bone  and 
sinew,  the  flesh  and  blood,  the  very  life-marrow  of  our 
spiritual  and  intellectual  consciousness,  uttered  as  in  the 
place  of  Christ,  and  with  the  breath  of  His  Spirit,  to  those 
whom,  whether  for  good  or  evil,  for  sorrow  or  gladness,  it 
must  either  persuade  or  harden,  win  or  lose,  for  ever. 

There  is,  first,  organization.    Some  years  ago  I  visited 
Greece,  and  from  the  summit  of  Pentelicus  I  looked  down 


46 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


over  the  tumulus  of  Marathon  and  the  gleaming  waters  of 
the  ^gean,  upon  the  hills  and  valleys  of  the  immortal 
land.  My  impression  when  I  came  away  was  of  a  some- 
what commonplace  character.  What  that  interesting 
country  seemed  to  need,  far  more  than  extended  territory, 
costly  armaments,  or  even  a  footstool  in  a  European 
congress,  was  roads.  Until  she  has  suitable  means  of 
communication  between  her  towns,  and  her  forests,  and 
her  mines,  and  her  quarries,  and  her  seaports,  she  will 
not  be  important;  for  she  cannot  be  prosperous.  What 
roads  are  to  the  commerce  of  a  country,  organization  is 
to  the  methods  of  a  Church.  If  it  does  not  make  work, 
it  often  suggests  it,  and  always  facilitates  it.  And  although 
it  is  not  our  loftiest  duty,  for  in  a  sense  it  can  never  be 
spiritual,  yet  we  know  from  the  Gospels  that  the  apostles 
mended  their  nets  as  well  as  used  them ;  and  I  suppose 
Noah  was  almost  as  much  a  preacher  of  righteousness 
when  he  was  building  the  ark,  as  when  he  was  entreating 
his  neighbours  to  enter  it.  It  is  not  for  us  to  choose  the 
duties  we  prefer,  to  the  neglect  of  those  we  dislike.  When 
we  are  clear  that  they  ai-e  duties  for  us,  we  must  grip  them, 
and  do  them  as  well  as  we  can.  Nor  is  it  for  us  to  say 
that  a  duty  is  so  small  that  we  may  evade  it  because  of 
its  smallness.  What  is  small  ?  what  is  great  ?  A  linch-pin 
is  not  the  biggest  part  of  a  wheel,  but  if  neglected  it  can 
take  a  terrible  revenge.^  Where  the  work  of  a  parish  is 
judiciously  mapped  out,  conveniently  subdivided,  punctually 
done,  and  steadily  maintained,  there  must  be  a  will  behind 

*  As  Calvin  observes  in  his  Institutes^  "  Hinc  et  eximia  consolatio 
nascetur,  quod  nullum  erit  tarn  sordidum  ac  vile  opus  quod  (modo 
tuae  vocationi  pareas),  non  coram  Deo  resplendeat,  et  pretiosissimum 
habeatur."-— Lib.  iii.,  cap.  x.  6. 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


47 


it  all,  which  can  only  be  kept  from  flagging  by  a  spirit  of 
energetic  and  exact  obedience ;  and  a  minister  of  Jesus 
Christ  who  is  punctual  in  answering  letters,  exact  in  keeping 
engagements,  prudent  in  choosing  instruments,  fertile  in 
contriving  resources,  cheerful  in  enduring  disappointment, 
patient  in  expecting  success,  and  courageous  in  risking 
failure,  though  he  may  sometimes,  by  those  who  do  not 
care  to  imitate  him,  jauntily  be  called  a  server  of  tables, 
yet  to  his  own  Master  he  standeth  or  falleth.  Depend 
upon  it  that  good  habits  of  business  cannot  yet  be  safely 
dispensed  with  by  those  who  have  to  discharge  the 
voluminous  and  complex  duties  of  an  English  clergyman. 
Bishop  Baring,  when  at  All  Souls',  was  a  striking  instance 
of  the  possibility  of  combining  close  attention  to  details 
and  a  great  faculty  of  administration  with  solid  teaching 
and  a  life  that  will  not  soon  be  forgotten. 

Then  there  is  the  pastoral  function,  which,  to  sustain 
continuously,  to  master  thoroughly,  to  discharge  spiritually, 
and  to  accept  cheerfully,  some  will  honestly  confess,  though 
not  so  much  with  the  poor  as  with  the  rich,  to  be  one  of 
the  hardest  tasks  of  their  lives ;  for  there  is  no  self- 
indulgence  involved  in  it,  though  abundance  of  self-sacrifice. 
As  Vinet  observes,  a  man  is  only  sure  of  his  vocation  for 
the  ministry  when  he  feels  moved  and  pressed  to  exercise 
the  cure  of  souls.  It  needs  the  patient  skill  of  the  solitary 
angler,  as  well  as  the  fling  and  splash  of  the  net  into  the 
deep  waters  for  the  glittering  spoils  leaping  into  the  wet 
meshes,  as  the  eager  hands  pull  it  to  the  shore.  Do  you 
remember  also  what  Bengel  says  about  it  ? — "  Experience 
teaches  us  that  many  souls  can  usefully  be  reached  by 
preaching;  but  with  most  men  the  work  of  grace  only 
operates  by  an  individual  treatment ;  so  that  we  must 


48 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


make  great  use  of  private  visits.    The  pastor  often  derives 
more  results  from  his  visits  than  from  his  public  preaching." 
And  he  adds,  in  a  passage  of  great  beauty,  which  I  must 
not  further  quote,  *'  Dear  pastors,  fill  your  hearts  with 
love  for  Christ."    I  said  just  now  it  is  hard, — hard  at  least 
to  do  well.    Personal  shyness ;  lack  of  the  very  rare  faculty 
of  originating  conversation  with  those  with  whom  we  do 
not  feel  to  have  many  ideas  in  common;  indolence,  whether 
mental  or  bodily,  that  bane  of  us  all;  a  certain  innate 
difficulty  of  speaking  anything  on  the  great  verities  of 
religion  (not  always  the  result  of  cowardice,  sometimes  of 
a  holy  delicacy  and  tender  reserve),  with  the  painful 
consciousness  of  continual  failure,  and  the  sadness  of 
humbling  failure  here; — all  these,  whether  singly  or  col- 
lectively, make  a  plan  of  systematic  visitation  very  hard 
for  some  of  us.    The  only  force  I  know  of  to  impel  us 
to  it  is  the  force  of  a  quick  and  restless  conscience ;  the 
only  motive  that  will  sustain  us  in  it  is  the  thought  of  the 
unspeakable  preciousness  of  the  souls  for  which  Jesus 
died.    These  will  overcome,  but  nothing  else  will.  These 
will  thaw  and  stir,  move  and  soften ;  give  courage  to  the 
timid,  and  patience  to  the  hasty;  tears  to  the  heart,  and 
wings  to  the  feet.    The  gospel  brought  to  the  ear,  looked 
into  the  eyes,  uttered  from  the  heart,  and  conveyed  by 
the  lips  of  one  who  is  literally  a  messenger  of  Jesus  Christ, 
and  who  goes  from  house  to  house  to  those  who  do  not 
care,  or  are  not  able,  to  come  to  him  to  hear  it,  has  a 
force  and  a  blessing  which  some  day  we  shall  be  amazed 
to  discover,  when,  in  the  hour  of  our  Lord's  return,  the 
souls  that  once  we  thought  so  hard,  and  flippant,  and 
morose,  and  immovable,  when  we  used  to  visit  them  in 
their  hours  of  occupation  or  in  their  moments  of  ease. 


MIX  I STE  RIAL  E  FFICI E  XC  Y. 


49 


shall  be  found  to  have  nursed  in  fruitful  hearts  the  seeds 
of  truth  we  timidly,  perhaps  coldly,  cast  upon  the  waters ; 
and  we  who  sowed  in  tears  shall  reap  in  joy. 

Another  part  of  our  ministry  is  the  conducting  of  public 
worship,  and  the  ministering  of  the  sacraments.  What  holy 
reverence,  what  calm  gladness,  what  scrupulous  carefulness, 
what  grave  collectedness,  should  our  own  demeanour  as  we 
pray,  the  very  sound  of  our  voice  as  we  speak,  convey  and 
impress  on  our  flock  around  us  !  When  we  read  Holy 
Scripture,  to  utter  each  sacred  word  as  in  the  name  and  for 
the  glory  of  Jesus ;  when  we  administer  the  sacraments, 
whether  of  initiation  into  the  Church,  or  edification  in  it,  to 
minister  as  men  possessed  with  the  lofty  but  awful  blessed- 
ness of  being  stewards  and  servants  of  God  ;  with  a  tender 
joyfulness  and  an  adoring  gratitude  at  being  permitted  to  be 
His  instruments.  Two  thoughts  may  well  fill  us  with  a  sense 
of  loss  and  also  of  surprise  :  How  strong  we  might  become, 
if  our  prayers,  through  being  really  uttered,  always  reached 
God  !  how  they  would  reach  Hira,  and  draw  from  His  wells 
of  salvation,  if  we  did  but  love  !  The  wandering  of  our 
prayers,  and  the  coldness  of  them,  their  feebleness,  and  so 
their  impotency,  may  well  shame  us  into  an  effort  to  try 
to  make  them  better,  and  thereby  help  us  to  the  secret  that 
better  to  pray  is  more  to  love.  From  my  very  heart,  to  you, 
my  brethren  in  Christ,  I  speak  this  word  :  learn,  learn  to 
worship,  through  better  trying  to  adore.  As  we  confess,  let 
us  think  of  the  blood  shed  for  us.  As  we  ask,  let  us  plead 
the  perpetual  intercession  of  the  Priest  upon  His  throne.  As 
we  praise,  let  us  remember  that  when  Jesus  praised,  it  was 
because  the  gospel  had  been  made  potent  to  the  poor  and 
simple.  As  we  intercede,  let  us  gather  into  our  heart  the 
great  tale  of  sorrow  and  trial  and  perplexity  and  solitariness 

E— 15 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


of  the  dear  souls  kneeling  all  around  us  ;  and,  with  some- 
thing of  the  love  of  the  Good  Shepherd  who  could  die  to 
save  them,  let  us  lay  them  in  prayer  on  His  heart.  Without 
this,  so-called  simplicity  is  baldness ;  and  with  this,  a  very 
barn  becomes  a  temple  of  God.  If  it  has  ever  been  possible 
to  say  of  evangelical  worship  that  it  is  cold  and  repelling, 
henceforth  let  it  be  impossible.  Without  comparing  invi- 
diously or  ungracefully  plain  services  with  musical,  this  we 
shall  all  agree  about,  that  heartiness  and  devoutness  are  the 
true  essentials  of  acceptable  worship  of  any  kind.  Yet  the 
steady  and  regular  responses  of  a  devout  congregation  have 
a  melody  about  them  which  is  at  least  a  spiritual  harmony. 
The  burst  of  sacred  song  from  hearts  which  know  personally 
the  blessedness  of  salvation  has  an  inimitable  grandeur  of 
its  own. 

Then  there  is  the  preaching  ;  and  here,  if  anywhere,  we 
may  say  with  emphasis  and  certainty,  the  preacher  is  as  the 
man.  Here,  too,  some  of  us  are  disposed  to  confess  that 
the  longer  we  preach  the  harder  we  find  it  to  reach  our  own 
standard ;  though  we  may  for  our  consolation  remember  the 
despair  of  the  artist  who,  in  the  supreme  work  of  his  genius, 
becoming  conscious  that  he  had  at  last  satisfied  himself, 
was  chilled  by  the  thought  that  he  could  no  longer  improve. 
Let  me  quote  here  the  words  of  St.  Cyran,  the  famous  Port 
Royalist,  in  a  letter  to  a  friend  :  Preaching  is  not  less  a 
terrible  and  tremendous  mystery  than  that  of  the  Eucharist. 
To  me  it  seems  that  preaching  is  much  more  terrible ;  for 
it  is  by  means  of  it  that  we  beget  and  raise  souls  to  God ; 
while  we  only  nourish  them  by  the  Eucharist,  or,  to  speak 
more  exactly,  heal  them.  For  a  man  to  make  himself 
worthy  of  this  function,  he  must  labour  to  put  great 
restraints  on  himself,  and  after  having  brought  his  heart 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


51 


to  desire  nothing  from  this  world,  to  reduce  his  tongue  to 
perfect  silence,  which  is,  as  I  understand  it,  the  last  per- 
fection a  man  acquires  striving  for  goodness  to  make  him 
worthy  to  deliver  the  Word  of  God  in  public,  where  one 
ought  more  to  fear  about  offending  Him  than  anywhere." 
The  solid  thought  behind  the  lucid  order ;  the  culture  that 
gleams  out  of  the  words,  and  the  style,  that  seems  so  facile, 
just  from  the  pains  taken  with  it,  but  which  w^mted  hours, 
perhaps  days^  for  its  winged  smoothness ;  the  subtle 
humour;  the  pathetic  action,  whether  of  hand,  voice,  or 
eye ;  most  of  all,  the  quiet  dignity  of  one  who  speaks  for 
Christ ;  the  holy  tenderness  of  one  who  knows  what  hangs 
on  the  message  being  accepted  or  being  despised ;  and  that 
He  who  is  not  ashamed  to  call  us  brethren,  and  who  yearns 
to  save  us,  will  not  force  even  a  little  child  to  love  Him 
against  its  will ;  the  glow  of  righteous  anger  at  sin  and 
meanness  and  selfishness,  which  can  rebuke,  yet  not  so  as 
to  exasperate  into  bitterness,  which  can  wound,  yet  with  the 
faithful  wounds  of  a  friend,  who  wounds  only  that  he  may 
heal ;  most  of  all,  the  quiet,  unconscious,  but  felt  power — 
the  power  of  an  indomitable  and  lofty  faith  that  breathes 
out  of  the  words,  because  the  grace  of  God  goes  with  them, 
and  because  he  who  speaks  them  came  straight  from  God 
before  he  began  to  speak  them,  goes  straight  back  to  God 
that  He  may  bless  them  when  they  are  done.  All  this  is 
easy  to  describe,  delightful  to  observe,  admirable  to  recom- 
mend, possible  to  attain,  as  Brainerd  and  Whitefield  attained 
them  in  days  of  old  :  not  impossible  for  us,  on  the  one 
condition  that  we  walk  closely  and  humbly  with  God. 

To  conclude :  There  is  a  noble  controversy  for  us, 
which  should  fire  us  with  its  lofty  ideal ;  there  is  also  a 
perilous  controversy,  which  a  wise  man,  who  knows  him- 


52 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


self,  and  loves  his  brethren,  will  be  in  no  great  hurry  to 
undertake. 

To  do  most  for  Christ  by  purity  of  doctrine,  by  steadi- 
ness of  effort,  by  abundance  of  prayer,  by  meekness  of 
charity,  should  be  our  only  controversy,  in  all  generous  and 
manly  love ;  then  not  only  shall  the  Church  gain,  and  those 
who  would  make  mischief  between  us  be  sorely  discomfited, 
but  there  will  be  no  compromise  of  faithfulness  to  tarnish 
our  honour,  and  no  loss  of  consistency  to  give  hoUowness 
to  our  words. 

But  the  perpetual  inspiration  for  life  and  for  motive, 
for  patience  and  for  sacrifice,  is  conscious  union  with  Christ. 
Christ  at  this  moment  is  different  to  each  one  of  us.  He 
differs  in  our  idea  of  His  perfection,  in  our  attainment  of 
His  image,  in  our  fruition  of  His  presence,  in  our  capacity 
for  His  love.  And  as  Christ  differs  for  us,  His  kingdom 
will  differ  by  us.  Oh,  to  get  nearer  to  His  face,  and  so 
better  see  His  glory,  and  be  in  deeper  sympathy  with  the 
l)urpose  of  His  cross  !  This  at  least  is  what  He  Himself 
tells  us  is  the  one  secret  of  glorifying  Him  in  the  world,  and 
of  discovering  His  truth  for  ourselves.  "  He  that  abidelh 
in  Me,  and  I  in  him,  the  same  bringeth  forth  much  fruit." 

Henceforth  I  call  you  not  servants,  but  I  have  called  you 
friends ;  for  all  things  that  I  have  heard  of  My  Father  I 
have  made  known  unto  you."  And  this  sustained  holy 
fellowship  will  mean  two  things  :  peace  for  our  own  hearts, 
and  intercession  for  our  people.  '-'Thou  shalt  hide  them 
in  the  secret  of  Thy  presence  from  the  pride  of  man.  Thou 
shalt  keep  them  secretly  in  a  pavilion  from  the  strife  of 
tongues."  As  the  greatest  of  American  Episcopal  preachers 
puts  it,  "  God  is  even  more  jealous  of  His  love  than  of  His 
honour.    Let  us  run  into  the  shelter  of  that  divine  life, 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


53 


just  creep  across  the  threshold — there  no  trouble  can  pursue  ; 
and  if  we  are  really  Christ's,  then  back  into  the  very  bosom 
of  His  Father — He  will  carry  us.  We  too  shall  look  out 
and  be  as  calm  and  independent  as  He  is.  The  needs  of 
men  shall  touch  us  just  as  keenly  as  they  touch  Him ;  but 
the  sneers  and  strifes  of  men  shall  pass  us  by,  as  they  pass 
Him  by,  and  leave  no  mark  on  His  unruffled  life."  ^  It 
will  also  help  us  to  intercession ;  and  our  ministry  with  our 
people  will  ever  depend  on  our  prayers  for  them.  Hear 
Massillon  :  Accompany  your  anxieties  with  your  prayers; 
speak  still  more  often  to  God  about  the  disorders  among 
your  people,  than  to  themselves ;  deplore  more  often  to 
Him  the  obstacles  which  your  own  unfaithfulness  offers  to 
their  conversion,  than  their  own  obstinacy  can  produce ; 
charge  yourselves  alone,  before  His  feet,  witli  the  scanty 
fruit  of  your  ministry;  as  a  tender  father,  excuse  in  His 
presence  the  faults  of  your  children,  and  accuse  only  your- 
selves." ^ 

Finally,  look  on,  seriously,  steadfastly,  solemnly,  to  the 
end  of  all.  As  I,  for  one,  look  back  over  a  ministry  of 
many  and  busy  years,  three  reflections  fill  my  spirit  with 
wonder  and  with  sadness  :  the  awfulness  of  the  responsibility 
which  I  have  so  feebly  appreciated  ;  the  grandeur  of  the 
duty  which  I  have  so  coldly  undertaken;  the  joy  of  the 
ministry  which  I  so  scantily  taste.  My  brethren,  my 
brethren,  the  cross  of  Christ  is  at  once  the  measure  of 
Divine  love  and  human  necessity,  and  the  story  of  that 
cross  we  are  to  preach,  and  to  live  for  the  salvation  of 
the  world.  Let  us  not  grow  accustomed  to  its  awfulness, 
nor  wearied   by  its  onerousness,  nor  indifferent  to  its 

'  "  Sermons,"  by  Rev.  Phillipii  Brooks,  pp.  96,  97. 
'  *'  Discours  sur  le  Zele  des  Pasteurs." 


54 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


reward.  Let  us  preach  our  sermons  first  to  ourselves. 
Let  us  humbly,  eagerly,  reverently,  faithfully,  use  the 
means  of  grace  for  our  own  spirit,  if  we  would  pass 
them  on  to  our  flocks,  which  we  are  to  feed  for  God. 
Let  us  remember  the  failing  strength,  the  waning  oppor- 
tunities, the  regrets  on  the  death-bed,  the  inevitable 
summons  to  the  judgment-seat  of  Christ.  You  remember, 
perhaps,  the  dying  regrets  of  Adolphe  Monod,  a  saint  of 
God,  if  ever  there  was  one  in  our  modern  time.  He 
regretted  that  he  had  not  learnt  to  better  purpose  that 
the  secret  of  a  holy,  active,  and  peaceable  life  is  in 
entire  self-surrender  to  God  both  of  will  and  plan. 
He  regretted  his  scanty,  desultory,  and  broken  study 
of  the  Word  of  God.  He  regretted  that  he  had  wasted 
time  through  not  being  sufficiently  methodical  and  pains- 
taking in  the  use  of  it.  He  regretted  his  prayers.  He 
regretted  the  absorbing  influence  of  trifles.  And  it  was 
too  late;  life  was  gone,  and  regrets  could  not  bring  back 
the  irrecoverable  past,  nor  could  experience  be  wisdom  for 
yesterday. 

As  I  began  I  end,  "  Ministerial  efficiency  is  dependent 
on  the  life  and  character  of  the  minister."  In  St.  Paul's 
way  of  putting  it,  Whatsoever  a  man  soweth,  that  shall 
he  also  reap."  It  is  souls  we  have  to  win,  and  we  shall 
best  win  them,  not  so  much  by  ingenious  dialectics,  or  vivid 
scene-painting,  or  massive  erudition,  or  emotional  appeals ; 
but  chiefly  by  the  awful  earnestness  of  men  who  are  fired 
with  zeal  for  God,  and  with  serious  sympathy  for  their 
.  brethren,  whose  goodness  is  the  breath  of  their  speech, 
and  their  consistency  its  rhetoric.  We  have  presently  to 
meet  our  flocks  in  eternity;  and  these  characters  of  ours, 
which  are  the  personal  forces  of  our  ministry,  we  are  our- 


MINISTERIAL  EFFICIENCY. 


55 


selves  forming  day  by  day,  to  be  our  spiritual,  indeiitructiblc 
inheritance  in  the  everlasting  future.  If  the  fiery  trial  which 
is  to  try  us  is  to  spare  our  ivork,  it  can  only  be  by  our  now 
welcoming  the  candle  of  the  Lord  to  search  us^  and  prove 
it ;  and  the  only  guarantee  for  our  personal  acceptance  and 
our  public  coronation  is  a    life  hid  with  Christ  in  God." 


THE   DIVINE  SILENCES. 


"  Your  thoughts  arc  making  you." 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES, 


Preached  in  the  Chapel  Koyal,  St.  James's,  March  2,  1890. 
"  But  He  answered  her  not  a  word." — Matt.  xv.  23. 

Christ,  we  see,  had  His  limitations,  His  moods  of  stern- 
ness, and  His  defeats.  His  limitations,  imposed  on  Him 
by  His  Father,  recognized  and  accepted  by  Him  in  un- 
questioning dutifulness,  and  given  as  the  reason  for  declining 
to  exercise  His  ministry  across  the  Jewish  boundaries,  are 
instructive  in  two  ways.  They  indicate  in  an  impressive 
and  striking  fashion  the  mighty  and  indisputable  fact  of  the 
Divine  Sovereignty,  which  crosses,  and  perplexes,  and,  it 
may  be,  disappoints  us  at  every  turn  of  life  ;  which  we  can 
neither  explain,  nor  deny,  nor  evade,  nor  resist ;  and  which, 
if  it  may  well  fill  some  of  us  with  unspeakable  thankfulness 
for  the  blessings  which  it  has  bestowed  on  us,  to  others  is 
the  unfathomable  problem  of  a  clouded  righteousness.  I 
am  not  sent  but  unto  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel." 
It  was  enough  for  Him  to  know  that,  and  He  accepted  it. 
His  Father  would  presently  justify  Himself  before  the 
world.  Of  course  the  limitation  of  His  ministry  to  the  Jews 
meant  the  loss  of  it  to  the  Gentiles ;  but  "  Shall  not  the 
Judge  of  all  the  earth  do  right  ?  " 


6o 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 


For  us  too,  though  in  a  sense  and  degree  far  different, 
to  know  our  limitations,  and  to  accept  them,  and  to  obey 
them,  is  the  supreme  secret  of  dignity  and  usefulness. 
Many  a  spoiled  life  can  be  traced  to  an  ambitious  effort  to 
transgress  this  Divine  order.  It  is  not  so  often  the  man 
with  five  talents  who  cares  or  tries  to  make  other  five  talents 
out  of  them,  as  the  man  with  but  two  talents,  who  knowing 
that  they  arc  only  two,  and  glad  that  they  are  as  many  as 
two,  manfully  and  cheerfully  sets  himself  to  make  them 
four. 

He  had  His  moods  of  sternness.  Let  us  confess  that 
in  this  pathetic  history  there  is  at  first  sight  something 
which  distresses  us  almost  to  pain.  If  we  were  to  be  silent 
to  each  other  as  the  Lord  was  silent  to  this  poor  troubled 
mother,  and  then  speak  with  the  abruptness  wherewith 
He  spoke  to  her,  a  great  deal  of  self-control  might  be 
needed  to  prevent  its  becoming  intolerable,  and  only  an 
immense  kindness  afterwards  could  obliterate  it  from  the 
mind. 

But  the  Lord  knew  His  purpose  and  her  tenacity.  A 
hasty  and  superficial  pity  might  have  marred  a  lifelong 
blessing.  In  the  words  of  the  prophet,  "  For  a  small 
moment  have  I  forsaken  thee,  but  with  everlasting  kindness 
will  I  have  mercy  on  thee,  saith  the  Lord  thy  Redeemer." 
In  truth.  His  love  was  far  too  strong,  and  deep,  and  holy 
to  have  anything  of  softness  or  weakness  about  it.  What 
we  call  kindness,  in  our  daily  relations  with  each  other, 
becomes  quite  a  different  thing  when  we  consider  it  as 
manifested  by  Christ.  His  kindness  braced  that  it  might 
heal,  waited  that  it  might  double  itself,  was  absolutely  in- 
different to  hasty  misconstruction  of  its  purpose,  and  in  the 
end  was  well  worth  waiting  for.   His  defeat  was  the  victory, 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES, 


6l 


which  the  fulness  of  His  own  grace  enabled  her  to  win 
from  His  love.  Faith  which  can  remove  mountains  can 
also  overcome  God.  It  is,  indeed,  the  grace  of  God  in 
man  concurring  with  the  eternal  purpose  in  God.  Christ 
wondered  at  it,  and  then  suffered  her  to  claim  from 
Him  all  that  she  desired.  "  O  woman,  great  is  thy  faith  : 
be  it  unto  thee  even  as  thou  wilt."  So  "the  kingdom 
of  heaven  sufTereth  violence,  and  the  violent  take  it  by 
force." 

"  He  answered  her  not  a  word."  On  the  Divine  Silences 
I  would  speak  now.  History  is -full  of  them.  The  Bible  is 
full  of  them.  Most  of  us  here  know  them  to  our  cost; 
also,  I  doubt  not,  for  our  consolation.  To  observe  the 
varieties  of  them,  to  discover  the  meaning  of  them,  to 
recognize  the  wisdom  of  them,  and  to  secure  the  bless- 
ing of  them,  is  to  go  a  very  long  way  in  fathoming  the 
counsels  of  God,  and  to  reconcile  us  to  the  hardness  of 
our  duty. 

There  are  questions  which  God  refuses  to  answer,  and 
tliere  are  questions  which  He  consents  to  answer,  and  for 
these  questions  much  light  is  to  be  gained  from  this  conduct 
of  Christ.' 

I.  The  questions,  at  least  some  of  them,  which  Christ 
did  not  answer  then,  and  will  not  answer  now,  are  dis/io?iesf, 
or  presuviptuous^  or  speculative^  or  controversial. 

He  will  not  answer  disJionest  questions,  by  which  I  mean 
questions  put  in  an  insincere  spirit,  or  with  the  judgment 
and  intention  already  matured,  or  with  no  thought  of  obedi- 
ence, or  with  motives  which  will  not  bear  the  Divine  scrutiny, 
or  in  an  almost  insolent  flippancy — 

*  Prebendary  Eyton  has  an  instructive  sermon,  to  which  I  owe 
much,  "  The  True  Life,"  p.  133. 


62 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 


"  Light  half-believers  of  our  casual  creeds 
Who  never  deeply  felt,  nor  clearly  willed, 
Whose  insight  never  has  borne  fruit  in  deeds, 
Whose  vague  resolves  never  have  been  fulfilled  ; 
For  whom  each  year,  we  see, 
Dreeds  new  beginnings,  disappointments  new, 
Who  hesitate  and  falter  life  away, 
And  lose  to-morrow  the  ground  won  to-day." 

(Matthew  Arnold.) 

When  the  Pharisees  demanded  a  sign  He  refused  it. 
Was  He  not  Himself  all  the  Sign  that  they  could  require  ? 
When  the  high  priest  said  unto  Him,  "  Answerest  Thou 
nothing  ?  "  He  held  His  peace.  When  Pilate  said,  Hearest 
Thou  not  how  many  things  they  witness  against  Thee  ?  " 

He  answered  him  to  never  a  word."  When  Herod 
saw  Jesus,  he  was  exceeding  glad,  and  he  questioned  with 
Him  in  many  words  ;  but  He  answered  him  nothing."  It 
was  partly  in  mercy,  for  it  might  have  been  only  to  increase 
their  condemnation  ;  partly  in  judgment,  for  a  seared  heart 
must  be  treated  as  it  deserves ;  partly  also  in  dignity. 
Could  the  Son  of  God  consent  to  amuse  the  vacant  hours 
of  a  vicious  and  cruel  king? 

Yes,  and  there  are  many  even  now  who  go  to  Christ 
with  their  questions,  not  knowing  what  it  is  they  want,  nor 
at  all  clear  that  He  has  it  to  give  them  ;  either  too  shallow 
to  be  really  in  earnest  or  too  worldly  to  consent  to  part 
with  a  single  bauble  for  the  love  of  God.  So  there  is  no 
voice ;  all  is  darkness  and  silence.  He  answers  them  not 
a  word ;  and  it  must  be  admitted  that  they  do  not  much 
care. 

There  are  presiimphious  questions,  questions  which  ought 
not  to  be  asked,  for  they  can  never  be  answered ;  questions 
which  skirt  the  mysterious  borderland  between  sense  and 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 


63 


spirit,  between  the  visible  and  invisible  worlds ;  questions 
on  which  neither  of  the  three  great  revelations  vouchsafed 
to  man  in  nature,  and  conscience,  and  Scripture  cast  one 
gleam  of  light ;  questions  for  which  Science,  properly  so- 
called,  has  nothing  but  an  ineffable  disdain,  and  Religion  a 
solemn  indignation. 

The  spirit-world  with  its  invisible  multitudes,  its  un- 
fathomed  capacities,  its  unknowable  occupations,  has  been 
deliberately  shut  off"  from  us  by  a  curtain  of  darkness.  To 
strive  to  peep  into  that  world,  to  filch  its  secrets,  and  to 
converse  with  its  inhabitants,  and  to  discover  what  they 
think,  and  feel,  and  do,  by  any  mechanical  jugglery,  such 
as  that  which  seems  to  fascinate  many,  whose  faith  is  not 
strong  enough  to  confess  a  living  God,  but  whose  super- 
stition is  base  enough  to  attempt  communion  with  the  dead, 
is,  to  my  mind  at  least,  a  far  more  shocking  phenomenon 
than  the  corrupt  animalism  of  the  Mormons ;  comes  nearer 
(if  there  is  anything  serious  in  it)  to  devil-worship  than  any- 
thing we  have  lately  seen  in  Western  Christendom. 

To  suppose,  even  for  a  moment,  that  He  who  has  the 
keys  of  Death  and  Hades  would  permit  spirits  in  discipline 
to  break  their  awful  captivity  just  to  gratify  the  inquisitive 
caprice  of  a  knot  of  triflers,  is  a  grave  insult  to  His  Divine 
Majesty.  Is  He  more  likely  to  spare  from  Paradise,  for 
the  same  unworthy  reason,  the  saints  who  see  His  Face 
and  hear  His  Word  ? 

~  Of  the  invisible  forces  of  the  evil  spirits,  their  number, 
their  varieties,  their  activities,  their  permitted  liberty,  we 
know  hardly  anything;  though,  indeed,  what  we  do  know 
is  hardly  matter  for  a  buff'oon's  jesting.  But,  if  we  are  in 
any  sense  Christians,  we  may  be  well  assured  that  they  too 
have  limits  which  they  cannot  transgress,  and  boundaries 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 


which  they  may  not  pass  over.  Indeed,  one  hardly  knows 
whether  to  smile  with  contempt  on  what,  if  it  be  only  a 
folly,  is  a  very  horrible  folly ;  or  to  denounce  with  indig- 
nation what,  if  it  is  a  sin  at  all,  is  a  very  ghastly  sin. 
Assuredly  it  is  not  a  pastime  to  be  safely  played  at.  No 
reverent  or  believing  heart  should  risk,  even  for  what  may 
euphemistically  be  called  a  phantasy  or  experiment  of 
science,  a  grave  dishonour  to  the  kingdom  and  supremacy 
of  Christ.  Christ  will  not  answer  a  word  to  such  audacious 
attempts  to  force  the  barriers  He  has  inflexibly  imposed 
upon  us.  If  there  ever  does  seem  to  be  an  answer — and  I 
fear  to  provoke  a  smile  by  hinting  the  possibility  of  it— it 
must  be  either  the  impudent  fraud  of  a  designing  charla- 
tanism, or  the  voice  of  one  whose  works  the  Son  of  God 
took  flesh  to  destroy. 

There  are  speculative  questions  which  Christ  will  not 
answer.  When  the  disciples  asked  Him,  "  Lord,  are  there 
few  that  be  saved?"  He  replied,  "Strive  to  enter  in  at 
the  strait  gate  ;  for  many,  I  say  unto  you,  shall  seek  to 
enter  in,  and  shall  not  be  able."  The  most  profound,  and 
reasonable,  and  melancholy,  and  yet  pressing  of  all  questions 
is  no  doubt  this— how  evil  came  into  the  world;  and  the 
most  honest,  even  if  it  be  helpless  and  disappointing,  answer 
is  simply  this— We  cannot  tell,  and  we  are  not  meant  to 
know.  In  the  teaching  of  our  Lord,  a  hint  about  it 
occasionally  falls  from  Him,  as  in  the  parable  of  the  tares, 
where  the  owner  of  the  field  is  made  to  say,  An  enemy 
hath  done  this."  When,  again.  He  healed  an  afflicted  woman 
in  the  synagogue,  He  said  of  her  that  Satan  had  bound  her 
for  eighteen  years ;  and  it  should  be  observed  that  no  figure 
is  used  here,  no  symbolirm,  simply  the  distinct  and  em- 
phatic assertion  of  a  tremendous  fact,  which  He  who  had 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 


65 


come  to  redeem  the  world  might  reasonably  be  expected 
both  to  understand  and  declare.  The  Bible  does  not 
profess  to  explain  the  mystery,  but  it  does  tell  us  that  evil 
is  to  be  overcome  with  good,  and  that  Chr'st  has  come 
into  the  world  to  do  battle  with  it,  and  that  we  are  to  help 
Him  in  the  battle,  and  that  at  last  all  shall  be  reconciled, 
and  the  mystery  cleared,  and  death  conquered,  and  God 
and  good  be  all  in  all. 

Once  more,  there  are  controversial  questions  which  He 
will  not  answer  \  for  were  they  answered,  we  might  lose  a 
very  wholesome  discipline  for  diffidence  and  charity.  AVhen 
the  disciples  asked  the  Lord,  "  Wilt  Thou  at  this  time 
restore  again  the  kingdom  to  Israel  ?  "  He  distinctly  declined 
to  give  them  an  answer.  There  are  other  matters,  too,  of 
commanding  interest,  and  of  real  importance,  about  which 
we  are  sometimes  tempted  to  think,  had  we  been  told  but 
a  little  more,  how  much  burning  controversy,  and  perilous 
division,  and  weakening  of  strength  in  the  face  of  the 
enemy  might  have  been  spared  to  the  Church  of  God. 
If,  for  instance,  but  one  clear  direction  had  been  given 
us  about  the  baptism  of  infants,  there  would  have  been 
no  opportunity,  or,  as  some  would  put  it,  no  justification 
for  a  separate  body  of  Christians,  to  whom  the  ordinance 
that  the  rest  of  us  so  dearly  love  seems  an  unreal  and  even 
superstitious  thing.  If  in  the  not  unimportant  matter  of 
Church  government  we  had  been  in  a  position  to  gather, 
not  only  from  logical  inference,  or  from  historical  con- 
tinuity, the  rule  of  order  most  pleasing  to  God  and  most 
edifying  for  man,  but  from  a  distinct  command  of  Christ, 
the  three  last  centuries  of  Christian  history  might  have 
been  spared  many  a  rent  and  tear  in  the  robe  of  outward 
unity;  also  many  a  blow  and  wound  aimed  by  hot  and 

F— 15 


66 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 


even  venomous  tongues  by  brother  against  brother,  and 
even  by  saint  against  saint. 

The  Head  of  the  Church  has  thought  and  ordered  other- 
wise. He  sees  further  than  we  see.  He  looks  deeper  than 
we  look.  It  is  not  for  us  to  scan  His  designs  ;  it  is  for  us 
to  accept  His  discipline.  If  we  go  to  His  Word  to  justify 
ourselves  in  arraigning  and  condemning  the  brethren  who 
differ  from  us,  there  is  no  reply.  When  we  consent  to  learn 
from  His  silence  to  decide  modestly,  to  tolerate  generously, 
to  judge  kindly,  to  love  sincerely,  a  Voice  comes  to  us,  and 
grace  goes  with  it :     Peace  be  unto  you." 

II.  Among  the  questions  He  consents  to  answer  are 
these,  and  they  are  very  practical  (though  we  do  not  always 
quite  appreciate  them) :  questions  about  pai7i,  and  about 
diiiy^  and  about  iruth^  and  about  failure. 

There  was  a  man  born  blind  from  his  birth,  and  the 
disciples,  regarding  him  with  a  wondering  pity,  asked  the 
Lord,  "  Who  did  sin,  this  man  or  his  parents,  that  he  was 
born  blind?"  They  felt,  as  so  many  of  us  feel  even  now, 
that  affliction  of  a  marked  kind  must  have  the  nature  of 
punishment  about  it,  and  that  we  suffer  because  we  have 
sinned.  The  Lord's  answer  is  most  instructive.  *'  Neither 
halh  this  man  sinned,  nor  his  parents  "  (in  the  sense  they 
put  on  it  of  having  deserved  such  an  affliction),  "  but  that 
the  works  of  God  should  be  made  manifest  in  him."  Pain^ 
we  see,  is  an  opportunity  from  God  to  man  for  glorifying 
Him,  by  patience,  and  unselfishness,  and  cheerfulness,  and 
power,  all  disciplined  thereby. 

We  have  observed  this  constantly  in  others,  and  some 
day,  it  may  be,  others  are  meant  to  see  it  in  us.  As 
man's  life  draws  towards  its  sunset,  a  chill  mist  often  falls 
on  what  we  call  our  happiness,  through  failing  health,  and 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES.  67 

vanishing  duties,  and  friends  departing,  and  the  dull 
opaque  years  with  no  pleasure  in  them.  Then  is  the  time  to 
show  that  we  can  trust,  and  endure,  and  hope,  and  praise ; 
that  we  can  love  God,  not  only  for  what  He  has,  but  for 
what  He  is ;  that  we  feel  Him  to  be  kind,  not  only  when  He 
gives,  but  when  He  takes  away.  If  the  final  discipline  of 
the  closing  years  is  the  school-time  for  Paradise,  it  may 
also  be  a  working  of  the  works  of  God  in  us,  by  the  lessons 
it  teaches  to  others  who  possibly  could  learn  them  in  no 
other  way.  They  who  stand  by  and  wait  on  us  should 
be  helped  to  discover,  as  no  books  or  sermons  could  teach 
them,  that  the  life  hid  with  Christ  in  God,  even  when  all 
active  service  is  a  thing  of  the  past,  has  its  lessons  of 
quiet  heroism  and  its  revelation  of  the  Unchanging  Pity. 
There  may  be  much  uselessness  in  the  fussy  hurryings  of 
a  restless  if  well-meaning  philanthropy ;  nothing  so  con- 
tinually or  irresistibly  glorifies  God,  and  manifests  His 
Presence,  as  the  quiet  and  even  joyful  suffering  of  His 
helpless  saints. 

He  will  answer  questions  about  duty^  though  the  answer 
may  startle  us,  and  at  first  seem  more  than  we  can  bear, 
and  at  last  drop  from  our  palsied  hands.  When  the  rich 
young  man  came  to  Christ,  with  his  perfectly  honest 
question,  what  he  was  to  do  to  "  inherit  eternal  life,"  Christ 
instantly  answered  him,  though  the  answer  fell  as  the  blow 
of  an  iron  flail  on  a  young  sapling,  and  crushed  his  eager 
hope.  The  Lord  could  not  water  down  duty  to  please 
any  one,  though  He  would  gladly  have  imparted  all  needful 
strength  for  doing  it,  had  it  been  desired.  Perhaps  it  is 
never  really  so  hard  to  discover  duty  as  to  resolve  on  doing 
it,  whatever  it  may  be  found  to  be.  To  all  of  us,  as  life 
goes  on,  there  will  occasionally  be  real  and  grave  per- 


68 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 


plexity  as  to  where  our  duty  lies  between  two  rival  claims 
on  us.  But  the  will  is  ever  the  straightest  road  to  the 
judgment,  and  "the  meek  will  He  teach  His  way." 
Christ  Himself  had  moments  when  impending  duty  seemed 
almost  intolerable,  and  He  can  feel  for  us.  To  know  our 
duty  is,  of  course,  quite  a  distinct  thing  from  consenting 
to  it ;  but  it  is  much  even  to  wish  to  know  it.  Christ 
pledges  Himself  to  show  it  to  us,  and  to  help  us  in 
getting  it  done.  He  will  answer  us  about  iinith  in  a 
degree  which  we  must  appreciate,  and  by  methods  which 
we  must  accept,  and  on  conditions  w^hich  we  must  observe. 
His  promise  to  us  is  not  to  impart  truth  instantly,  or 
entirely,  or  infallibly,  but  by  His  Spirit  to  show  us  the 
way  into  all  truth,  and  then  to  leave  us  there  to  find  it 
for  ourselves  as  individual  capacity,  and  gifts,  and  the 
leisure  at  our  disposal,  and  mental  sincerity,  and  other 
concurring  helps  and  circumstances  may  make  it  possible. 
The  laws  of  thought  cannot  be  repealed  for  any  school 
of  learners  or  for  any  department  of  truth.  They  are 
unchanging  and  universal.  Nor  will  He  even  help  us 
to  truth  if  we  choose  to  despise  human  aids,  or  refuse  to 
learn  from  our  brethren,  or  think  study  superfluous  and 
books  a  fatigue.  Also  there  are  moral  conditions  to 
intellectual  progress.  "  If  any  man  will  do  His  will,  he 
shall  know  of  the  doctrine."  Humility  which  confesses 
ignorance,  and  docility  which  welcomes  light,  and  industry 
which  labours,  and  sagacity  which  compares — all  have 
their  great  reward.  In  Mr.  lUingworth's  striking  language, 
"  Christianity  distinctly  declines  to  be  proved  first  and 
practised  afterwards.  Its  practice  and  its  proof  go  hand 
in  hand;  and  its  real  evidence  is  its  power."  ^ 

^  "Lux  Mimdi,"  p.  211. 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 


69 


Truth  is  inexhaustible,  and  he  who  has  gained  most 
will  be  first  to  confess  how  little  he  has  gained.  But  the 
doctrine  which  teaches  of  God  has  a  special  condition 
attached  to  it,  which  no  other  doctrine  can  claim  in  a  like 
way ;  and  a  benediction  going  with  it.  "  Blessed  are  the 
pure  in  heart :  for  they  shall  see  God." 

He  will  also  answer  questions  about  our  failures.  He 
knew  disappointment,  and  keenly  felt  it,  in  the  days  of  His 
flesh,  though  His  came  to  Him  from  the  slowness  and  per- 
versity which  constantly  encountered  Him,  and  through  no 
fault  in  Himself.  He  will  mercifully  enter  into  ours,  though 
sin  and  infirmity  be  at  the  root  of  them,  and  will  enable  us  to 
understand,  and  even  surmount  them  in  the  patience  of  hope. 

Why  could  not  we  cast  him  out  ?  "  was  the  troubled 
question  of  the  disciples,  when  baffled  in  their  treatment 
of  the  demoniac  child.  "Because  of  your  unbelief,"  was 
the  reply.  Unbelief  is  a  weakness  with  many  elements 
in  it ;  its  chief  mischief  being,  that  it  palsies  the  hand 
which  should  grasp  the  Divine  Omnipotence,  and  closes 
the  eye  of  the  soul  which  should  catch  its  inspiration  from 
the  vision  of  God.  Never  to  be  disappointed  is  not 
greatly  to  care  ;  always  to  be  disappointed  must  mean  to 
be  very  weak  or  very  foolish  ;  sometimes  to  be  disappointed 
may  even  be  a  sort  of  honour. 

But  our  duty  is  to  take  our  disappointments  to  Christ, 
and  our  wisdom  is  to  consult  Him  about  them,  and  our 
safety  is  to  do  what  He  bids  us,  and  our  joy  is  to  expect 
their  final  reward.  For  what  looks  to  us  like  failure,  may 
be  but  the  seed  waiting  in  the  frozen  earth  for  warmth  and 
moisture.  Disappointment  is  often  but  a  deferred  success. 
Over  a  world  still  lying  in  the  wicked  one  hangs  the  shadow 
of  the  cross  on  which  the  Saviour  died. 


70 


THE  DIVINE  SILENCES. 


My  friends,  of  this  let  us  be  perfectly  sure ;  that  what- 
ever may  be  Christ's  silences  to  those  who  deserve  them, 
He  is  never  really  silent  to  those  who  desire  His  salvation, 
and  crave  His  grace,  and  bear  His  cross,  and  trust  His 
love.  It  is  easier  for  the  sun  to  fall  out  of  the  sky  than 
for  Him  to  be  hard,  or  cold,  or  indifferent  to  the  humblest 
soul  that  seeks  His  face.  For  a  moment  He  may  seem 
to  be  on  the  top  of  the  mountain  far  away  in  the  darkness, 
while  we  are  being  tossed  in  the  storm.  It  is  night,  and 
Jesus  is  not  with  us.  But  the  faintest  cry  of  distress,  or 
alarm,  or  loneliness  reaches  Him  as  He  offers  His  inter- 
cession for  us.  He  hastens  to  us,  though  in  a  shape  we  may 
■  not  always  recognize,  and  in  a  way  that  we  cannot  instantly 
\  understand.  Yet,  whether  He  comes  walking  on  the  water 
over  the  midnight  sea ;  or  hails  us  from  the  shore,  wearied 
w.ih  thankless  toil ;  or  at  the  graveside  speaks  to  us,  while 
the  tears  blind  Him,  it  is  no  longer  true  of  Him  that  He 
answers  us  not  a  word.  The  silence  is  broken.  His  voice 
whispers,  It  is  I ;  be  not  afraid,"  and  there  is  a  great 
calm. 


THE  POWER  or  COURAGE. 


"The  worst  of  the  worthy  people  is  that  they  are  such  cowards.  A 
man  groans  over  a  wrong ;  he  holds  his  tongue,  he  eats  his  supper  and 
he  forgets  all  about  it." 


THE  POWER  OF  COURAGE. 


Preached  at  the  Coiisecraiion  of  Lyss  CImycJi:,  July  2,  1892. 

"  Fear  not,  but  let  your  hands  be  strong." — Zech.  viii.  13. 

It  cannot  be  hard  to  see  how  the  Church  of  Zechariah's 
time  needed  the  tonic  of  vigorous  counsel.  For  there  was 
something  to  fear  then;  and  to  be  absolutely  free  from 
anxiety  would  have  implied  either  the  presence  of  a  stolid 
apathy,  or  the  lack  of  a  righteous  jealousy  for  God.  The 
yet  recent  captivity  had  worked  its  iron  into  men's  souls. 
The  ruined  temple,  while  it  demanded  their  entire  energies, 
rapidly  exhausted  them.  Disunion  in  their  midst  bred  a 
sour  and  paralyzing  suspiciousness,  and  mocking  enemies 
under  the  shadow  of  the  city  walls  threw  a  chill  into  their 
hearts.  Yet  even  then  the  prophet  did  not  shrink  from 
forbidding  them  to  fear  j  and  while  he  deprecated  the 
mischief,  indicated  the  remedy.  That  remedy,  if  we  may 
so  speak  of  it  in  our  modern  conventional  language,  is  the 
very  perfection  of  good  sense.  Clearly  he  might  have  said, 
"  Your  alarm  is  exaggerated,"  which  though  true  would 
have  been  hable  to  be  disputed.  Or  he  might  have 
suggested  that  with  a  little  patience  it  would  disappear, 
which  would  have  been  like  comforting  a  farmer  gazing 
on  his  drenched  crops  with  the  prospect  of  next  year's 


74 


THE  POWER  OF  COURAGE. 


harvest.  What  he  does  say  not  only  inculcates  a  precept, 
but  presses  the  way  of  performing  it ;  for  while  he  forbids 
alarm,  his  antidote  is  duty.  "  Fear  not,  but  let  your  hands 
be  strong." 

To  work,  my  friends,  is  the  secret  of  courage  for  us  all. 
For  while  it  is  noble  to  trust,  and  inspiring  to  hope,  and 
prudent  to  watch,  and  manful  to  wait,  and  blessed  to  pray, 
there  are  crises  in  life  when  the  trusting,  and  hoping,  and 
w^atching,  and  waiting,  and  praying  are  to  be  all  welded 
and  concentrated  in  action.  When  Joshua,  after  the  defeat 
at  Ai,  fell  on  his  face  before  the  Captain  of  the  Lord's  host, 
the  answer  came  to  him — "  Get  thee  up ;  wherefore  liest 
thou  thus  on  thy  face  ?  .  .  .  Up,  sanctify  the  people."  To 
the  apostles  in  Gethsemane,  roused,  ashamed,  penitent, 
ready,  had  they  had  the  chance  to  watch  and  pray  ten 
nights  with  their  Lord,  the  monition  came  with  almost  a 
stern  promptness — "  Rise,  let  us  be  going." 

And  the  reason  is  plain.  The  heart  brooding  over 
weakness  and  danger  magnifies  them,  and  thereby  makes 
its  task  heavier.  Anticipated  difficulties  sometimes  never 
happen ;  and  then  we  have  wasted  moral  nerve,  and  perhaps 
wholesome  emotion,  in  slaying  lions  that  do  not  cross  our 
path.  It  is  not  only  actual  power  we  need  to  make  us 
strong,  but  that  consciousness  of  it  which  gives  it  its 
leverage ;  and  whatever  diminishes  the  leverage  checks  the 
force.  Possessed  with  its  duty,  happy  in  it,  and  too  much 
absorbed  in  it  either  to  watch  the  fleeting  clouds,  or  to 
listen  to  the  cawing  of  gloomy  idlers,  the  soul  holds  itself 
in  peace  ;  and  evil  tidings,  when  they  come,  cannot  move  it 
from  its  steadfastness. 

Fear  not,  but  let  your  hands  be  strong."  About  which 
words,  let  me  first  observe  that  the  prophet  did  not  mean 


THE  POWER  OF  COURAGE. 


75 


to  say,  and  we  must  not  pretend  to  think,  that  the  Church 
has  nothing  to  fear,  wherever  she  is,  whatever  she  does. 
This  would  be  presumption  indeed.  "  Others  save  with 
fear,"  writes  St.  Jude.  There  is  ever  much  in  ourselves 
that  we  ought  to  fear,  must  fear,  if  we  be  true  Christians. 
Yet,  as  I  shall  proceed  to  show,  there  assuredly  is  nothing 
out  of  ourselves  and  independent  of  us  that  we  need  fear, 
if  we  will  only  hold  fast  by  God.    For  instance — 

I.  We  ought  to  fear  that  unnecessary  and  unchristian 
disunion  which,  springing  not  from  a  holy  faithfulness, 
but  from  a  sour  and  narrow  egotism,  is  grievous  to  the 
mind  of  Christ,  and  secretly,  but  fatally,  dismembers  His 
Lody.  We  ought  to  fear  that  base  prudence  which  can 
whip  the  poor  with  the  cords  of  sharp  rebuke,  but  holds  its 
peace  at  the  sins  of  the  wealthy  ;  and  which,  keeping  back 
truth  lest  it  offend  those  on  whose  favour  our  worldly 
advancement  may  perhaps  be  hanging,  first  asks,  ''Will  this 
please  my  powerful  hearers  ? "  instead  of  considering  if  it  is 
the  message  of  God.  Most  of  all,  let  us  fear  even  for  a 
moment  to  weigh  as  with  an  ant's  wing  against  the  scales 
of  duty  and  conscience,  the  breath  of  popular  favour,  or  the 
possible  schemes  of  destructive  statesmen,  which,  to  some 
men's  eyes,  are  already  bringing  a  mighty  and  sudden  chasm 
to  yawn  under  our  feet,  and  smiting  a  timid  few  with  a  panic 
which  so  justly  compels  the  cynical,  but  quite  reasonable 
inquiry,  if  the  Church  is  really  a  divine  institution,  or  only 
the  paid  hireling  of  men.  Over  such  unworthy  alarms  a 
man's  heart  gets  into  a  white  heat  of  Christian  shame;  and 
I  name  them  only  to  dismiss  them  with  contempt.  The 
love  of  ease,  the  fear  of  man,  the  power  of  the  sinful  nature 
within  us,  the  love  of  Christ  growing  cold,  and  through  that 
coldness  souls  perishing  for  which  He  died, — these  things 


76 


THE  POWER  OF  COURAGE. 


we  will  fear ;  though  indeed,  if  we  are  wise,  we  shall  not  too 
much  dwell  upon  them.  For  just  as  the  human  body  is 
not  braced,  but  depressed  rather,  by  the  air  of  a  putrid 
marsh,  no  man's  soul  is  helped  by  too  much  contemplation 
of  his  weakness  and  sin. 

2.  But  I  will  now  tell  you  what  we  need  not  fear.  For 
ours  is  a  righteous  Master ;  as  righteous  as  He  is  kind. 

We  need  not  fear  the  overwhelmingness  of  our  labour. 
Of  course  we  think  not  only  of  the  work  that  is  being  done, 
but  of  that  which  is  to  be  done.  There  are  not  only  the 
people  that  are  all  round  here,  but  the  people  that  are 
coming  here.  Some  of  us  never  can  overtake  our  work — 
hardly  even  get  within  sight  of  it.  The  rapid  increase  of 
population  might  well  make  the  Church  faint  and  tremble 
at  the  duty  accumulating  for  her,  if  she  did  not  know  that 
all  grace  is  hers ;  might  tempt  her  feebly  to  complain  that 
the  task  laid  on  her  shoulders  is  more  than  she  is  able  to 
bear,  if  it  were  not  even  more  the  task  of  her  Lord.  And 
when  we  think  of  the  thousands  and  tens  of  thousands 
of  redeemed  souls  all  over  the  diocese,  practically  destitute 
of  means  of  grace,  or  at  least  indifferent  to  them — passing 
from  childhood  into  youth,  and  from  youth  into  manhood, 
and  from  manhood  to  old  age,  and  from  old  age  to  the 
judgment-seat  of  Christ,  "having  no  hope,"  so  far  as  we 
know,  *'and  without  God  in  the  world" — we  might  well 
be  daunted  in  even  attempting  to  touch  a  burden  with 
which  it  seems  impossible  to  grapple. 

But,  I  say,  we  serve  a  just  Master,  who  knows  what 
we  are  to  whom  the  task  is  given,  and  what  we  need 
for  doing  it  when  it  is  given.  We  are  limited,  and  He 
Himself  has  made  us  so.  Limited  in  our  bodily  strength  ; 
limited  in  our  mental  freshness;  limited  in  the  number 


THE  POWER  OF  COURAGE. 


77 


of  our  opportunities ;  limited  even  in  the  power  of  our 
devotion.  He  knows  us,  and  He  bears  with  us,  and  He 
pities  us  (let  us  hope)  more  than  we  think  of.  Also  He 
uses  and  blesses  us.  If  some  of  His  servants  have  never 
for  the  last  thirty  years  of  their  lives  been  able  with  any 
sort  of  adequacy  to  discharge  the  enormous  duties  of  an 
English  and  urban  miinistry,  we  must  nevertheless  cast 
our  burden  on  the  Lord,  with  all  consciousness  of  im- 
perfection, but  in  humble  trust  on  His  grace.  He  knows 
them  that  are  His,  and  if,  with  all  their  faults  and  short- 
comings, they  try  their  best  to  be  faithful,  He  will  welcome 
and  crown  them  at  last. 

3.  Once  more,  as  men,  we  need  not  fear  the  disaster 
of  adverse  circumstances,  whether  of  murrain  or  tempest, 
of  revolution  or  change.  If  any  Church  in  the  world 
ought  to  be  delivered  from  fear  of  circumstances  into  a 
calm  trust  in  God,  it  is  our  dear  Church  of  England.  "God 
is  in  the  midst  of  her ;  she  shall  not  be  moved  :  God  shall 
help  her,  and  that  right  early." 

And  this  is,  I  think,  a  lesson  that  we  need  to  be  reminded 
of  now.  Of  course,  I  do  not  mean  that  she  has  not  had 
storms  which  have  furiously  tossed  her,  as  the  shrieking 
wind  sweeps  down  upon  a  lonely  ship  on  the  winter  sea ; 
or  that  she  has  not  had  again  and  again  to  pass  through 
fires  that  have  scorched  her  to  the  very  bone,  and  put 
her  to  bitter  suffering.  The  storm  has  in  the  end  only 
rooted  her  more  firmly  in  the  earth,  and  out  of  the  fire 
she  has  come  pure  and  cleansed  and  strong.  The  Church 
fell  on  evil  days,  as  men  thought  then.  Yes,  and  on 
very  gloomy  days,  when  the  great  Rebellion  swept 
over  the  land  with  its  besom  of  destruction,  and  the 
Church's  rulers  and  pastors  were  driven   out  of  their 


;8 


THE  POWER  OF  COURAGE. 


posts  and  homes,  and  her  organization  seemed  totally  sub- 
merged as  with  the  wave  of  a  typhoon.  But  time  went 
on ;  and  whether  or  no  the  lesson  was  fully  learned,  God 
restored  to  her  her  heritage,  and  she  has  kept  it  to 
this  hour.  Presently  another  trial  came,  with  the  second 
James.  We  know  how  he  put  his  own  representatives  into 
the  chair  of  Magdalen  College ;  how  this  time  Rome  was 
again  her  foe,  instead  of  Puritanism  ;  how  seven  bishops 
went  to  the  Tower  for  the  liberty  and  faith  of  England  ; 
and  came  out,  having  for  us,  as  well  as  for  their  own  time, 
won  their  cause.  That  storm  came,  and  was  spent  long 
ago.  Again,  just  fifty  years  ago,  about  the  time  of  the  first 
Reform  Bill,  the  Church  was  in  peril  again,  and,  to  save 
the  vessel,  much  of  her  precious  cargo  was  hastily  thrown 
overboard.  She  righted  herself,  and  has  gone  on  till  now, 
wiser,  and  I  think  stronger.  To-day  people  are  beginning 
to  be  frightened  again,  and  I  say  that,  if  they  will  be 
frightened,  let  them  be  frightened.  But  they  shall  not 
frighten  us,  when  God  is  saying,  in  a  voice  we  will  listen  to, 
"  Fear  not,  but  let  your  hands  be  strong ; "  and  it  seems 
to  us  it  will  be  time  enough  to  be  frightened  when  the 
Church  is  losing  hold  of  the  love  of  the  people,  instead 
of,  as  she  plainly  is,  ever  more  gaining  it ;  when  she  deserves 
rejection  for  her  smoothness,  rather  than  tempting  it  by 
her  courage  ;  when  she  will  cease  to  be  an  object  of  alarm 
and  jealousy  because  no  one  any  longer  thinks  her  worth 
either  notice  or  attack — though  she  will,  no  doubt,  be 
always  worth  spoiling  ;  when  all  that  she  really  retains  will 
be  the  gold  in  her  purse,  and  a  certain  social  precedence 
for  her  great  clergy,  but  has  lost  the  grace  of  God,  the  love 
of  souls,  and  the  esteem  of  men. 

Fear,  God  forbid.    For  whatever  may  be  in  front  of  us, 


THE  POWER  OF  COURAGE. 


79 


the  benediction  of  God  shall  compensate  for  the  conduct 
of  men.  "  All  things  shall  work  together  for  good  to  them 
that  love  God."  Only  let  us  love  God  and  our  people  for 
His  sake,  and  make  our  lives  show  it,  then  we  are  un- 
assailable in  all  that  touches  our  true  riches,  and  are 
immortal  in  all  that  affects  our  heavenly  life.  And  His 
word  to  us  shall  be,  Be  not  afraid,  but  speak,  and  hold  not 
thy  peace.  For  I  am  with  thee :  and  no  man  shall  set  on 
thee  to  hurt  thee ;  for  I  have  much  people  in  this  city." 

4.  Once  more,  let  active  love,  that  is,  duty  (the  natural 
result  and  child  of  love),  cast  out  fear. 

*'  Let  your  hands  be  strong  " — socially  and  personally ; 
strong  in  the  fearless  vindication  of  the  everlasting  gospel ; 
strong  in  the  unwearied  and  incessant  ministrations  of  kindly 
sympathy  and  love ;  strong  in  the  undaunted  rebuke  of  sin 
and  falsehood,  and  social  injustice  and  private  iniquity ; 
strong  in  the  manful  independence  of  the  inner  conscience 
of  the  heart.  Men  want  the  gospel,  and  expect  us  to  give 
it  them;  and  are  disappointed,  and  wonder  what  we  are 
meant  for  if  we  do  not  give  it  them.  Be  not  ashamed  of 
the  gospel  of  Christ,  for  it  is  the  power  of  God  unto 
salvation.  Let  your  neighbours  know  and  use  you  as  a 
Christian  friend.  This  is  the  true  way  to  be  strong.  The 
Church  lives  and  grows  only  through  the  personal  sympathy 
and  influence  of  her  individual  members.  If  the  clergy 
and  the  laity  want  the  Church  to  remain  as  she  is,  the 
condition,  under  God,  of  its  so  remaining  rests  with  them. 
Let  them  deserve  it ;  and  the  nation  will  still  be  theirs. 

Oh,  fear  the  face  of  no  man,  neither  prince  nor  peasant, 
neither  gentle  nor  simple,  neither  child  nor  patriarch, 
neither  friend  nor  foe.  Love  truth  and  peace ;  not  truth 
without  peace,  nor  peace  before  truth,  but  both  together. 


So 


THE  POWER  OF  COURAGE. 


Be  true,  be  true,  be  true.  And,  remember,  to  be  true,  we 
need  not  be  harsh,  or  passionate,  or  cold,  or  bitter.  While 
in  God's  presence,  and  from  God's  face,  we  must  get 
courage — when  we  have  to  speak  even  before  kings  and  not 
be  ashamed — yet  our  words,  being  steeped  in  charity,  shall 
sink  like  oil  into  the  soul,  and,  even  against  their  will,  men 
will  listen,  soften,  and  obey. 

Once  more,  the  crown,  and  link,  and  perfection,  and 
fragrance  of  all  is  love.  Little  children,  love  one  another." 
"By  this  shall  all  men  know  that  ye  are  My  disciples, 
if  ye  have  love  one  to  another." 

For  love  is  at  once  a  sword  and  a  shield  ;  it  is  a  weapon 
that  none  can  resist,  and  it  is  a  shield  which  nothing  can 
penetrate.  It  carries  with  it  both  felicity  and  recompense. 
He  who  loves  most  has  most  happiness,  because  he  who 
loves  most  has  back  again  into  his  own  spirit  the  largest 
share  of  the  love  that  he  has  suggested  and  earned. 

They  say,  if  you  want  to  forgive  man,  pray  for  him — 
though  a  wise  man  would  never  tell  him  of  it.  For  prayer 
compels  you  to  love  him,  and  where  you  love  you  pardon. 

It  is  quite  as  true  to  say,  that  to  love  both  makes  friends 
and  disarms  enemies.  If  nothing  brings  men  together  like 
a  common  danger,  nothing  knits  them  like  a  common  duty ; 
and  what  forbids  the  one,  and  inspires  the  other,  is  the 
parting  promise  on  Olivet  :  "  Lo,  I  am  with  you  alway, 
even  unto  the  end  of  the  world." 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


G— 15 


'  The  man  who  has  lived  most  is  not  he  who  has  counted  most  years, 
he  who  has  most  felt  life." 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED, 


Preached  in  St.  FauPs  Cathedral,  May  12,  1890. 
"The  seed  is  the  Word  of  God."— Luke  viii.  11. 

Our  times  have  been  happily  called  "  the  times  of  Christ ;  " 
and  if  they  are  not  His  times,  whose  can  they  be  ?  Cer- 
tainly they  are  the  best  times  the  world  has  seen  since  He 
went  back  to  His  glory;  certainly,  also,  faith,'ever  bold  and 
hopeful  in  proportion  to  its  devotion  and  sacrifices,  looks 
for  them  to  be  better  and  better,  until  He  finally  returns  to 
*'make  all  things  new."  Does  any  one  ask,  How  can  they 
be  Christ's  times,  when  evil  is  so  insolent  and  strife  so  bitter, 
and  the  air  hideous  with  discord  and  blasphemy ;  when  anti- 
christs meet  us  at  the  corner  of  every  street,  and  mockingly 
ask  us,  "Where  is  now  thy  God?"  We  say,  that  if  they 
are  the  times  of  Christ  they  must  be  the  times  of  antichrist, 
— that  the  kingdom  of  light,  by  its  presence  and  potency, 
must  stir  into  a  malignant,  if  brief,  activity  the  powers  of 
darkness,  though  only  to  disperse  them  and  triumph ;  and 
that  they  are  the  times  of  Christ,  because  now,  more  than 
ever,  in  the  power  of  His  Eternal  Spirit,  He  lives,  speaks, 
moves,  persuades,  conquers,  reigns,  not  only  among  the 
towns  and  villages  of  our  dear  country,  but  in  the  continents 


84 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


and  islands  over  the  sea.  You  Sunday-school  teachers, 
b^nt  on  one  errand,  fired  with  one  hope,  serving  one  Lord, 
desiring  one  victory,  are  the  best  proof  of  it.  But  a  handful 
of  the  704,000  teachers  from  all  the  religious  bodies  in 
Great  Britain,  just  out  of  love  to  the  same  risen  Lord,  and 
in  gratitude  for  the  one  common  salvation,  you  are  con- 
strained by  the  sweetness  of  the  love  which  passeth  know- 
ledge, to  feed  the  lambs  He  commits  to  your  care.  The 
seed  is  the  Word  of  God." 

There  are  three  varieties  of  application,  in  which  this 
instructive  symbol  indicates  the  operative  forces  that  work 
towards  the  kingdom  of  God.  Each  singly,  all  conjointly, 
and  consistently  inspire  faith  and  suggest  duty  for  the  cause 
we  desire  to  serve.  Christ  our  Lord,  the  Word  Incarnate,  is 
Himself,  in  virtue  of  His  Incarnation,  the  Seed  immanent  in 
humanity,  lifting  it  into  a  new  condition,  conferring  on  it  a 
fresh  dignity,  redeeming  it  unto  a  great  future.  When  St. 
Paul  wrote  to  the  Coiinthians, The  Head  of  every  man  is 
Christ,"  he  propounded  a  majestic  truth,  the  entire  signifi- 
cance of  which  the  present  age  has  not  perhaps  fully  com- 
prehended, but  which  is  of  unspeakable  significance  for  the 
race. 

The  Church,  which  is  His  Body ;  His  Word,  so  far  as  it 
delivers  His  message ;  His  instrument,  when  it  organizes  His 
methods;  His  representative,  if  it  manifests  His  life;  His 
spouse,  when  it  receives  His  love,  is  in  its  turn  the  divine 
seed  of  human  society  invisibly,  slowly,  imperfectly,  with 
many  hindrances  and  disappointments,  yet  constantly  and 
irresistibly,  shining  on  its  darkness  and  preventing  its  cor- 
ruption, and  declaring  its  redemption,  and  promising  its 
grace ;  by  its  fabrics,  and  its  worship,  and  its  history,  and 
its  creeds,  both  in  its  corporate  life,  and  according  to  the 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED.  85 

working  of  each  of  its  manifold  parts,  declaring  all  the 
counsel  of  God. 

The  individual  Christian  who  understands  that  he  has 
been  saved  chiefly  that  he  may  do  his  best  to  save  others, 
and  who  knows  that  he  has  been  bought  with  a  price,  that 
he  may  glorify  Him  who  at  such  a  cost  has  bought  him,  is 
also  in  a  real  sense  the  Word  of  God,  or  as  St.  Paul  in  an 
equivalent  expression  has  called  him,  the  epistle  of  Christ, 
known  and  read  of  all  men :  by  the  life  he  lives,  and  the 
cross  he  carries,  and  the  message  he  utters,  and  the  duties 
he  loves,  the  fruitful  seed  of  single  souls,  personally  influenc- 
ing them,  patiently  instructing  them,  drawing  them  with 
cords  of  love,  winning  them  one  by  one  into  fellowship  with 
Jesus;  and  it  is  on  man,  the  seed  of  man — you,  for  example, 
the  seed  of  the  souls  of  the  children,  given  you  to  teach — 
that  I  have  to  speak  now. 

Let  us  consider  this  seed  of  the  everlasting  gospel. 

I.  In  the  activities  which  it  demands  :  which  are  chiefly 
three — sowing,  watering,  reaping.  Sowing  is  casting  the 
seed  of  divine  truth  into  the  minds  and  hearts  of  the  young, 
leaving  it  there  to  work  out  the  mystery  of  its  life,  as  it  may 
please  God  to  use  it,  trusting  about  it  the  Fatherly  love  of 
Him  the  measure  of  whose  redeeming  pity  is  the  atoning 
anguish  of  His  Son.  There  are,  of  course,  all  varieties  of 
skill  and  of  diligence  and  of  self-sacrifice  in  this  work  of 
sowing.  In  the  kingdom  of  grace,  as  well  as  in  the 
kingdoms  of  this  world,  nothing  great  can  be  achieved 
without  taking  trouble.  God  giveth  the  increase — here 
is  the  supreme  factor  in  all  our  success.  It  is  equally  true 
that  "  every  man  shall  receive  his  own  reward  according  to 
his  own  labour."  Watering  does  not  mean  the  impatient, 
emotional,  restless  eftbrts  of  an  unconscious  unbelief  to  give 


86  THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


God  the  help  He  neither  asks  nor  cares  for  ;  but  the  vigilant 
looking  for  the  germinating  of  the  seed,  the  expecting  of 
results,  here  or  there,  to-day  or  to-morrow,  because  God's 
Word  cannot  return  to  Him  void — not  to  look  for  results 
is  but  slightly  to  care  for  them — also  that  humble,  fervent, 
pleading  with  Him  in  fervent,  even  passionate  prayer,  for 
those  showers  of  blessing  whereby  His  Spirit  moves  on  the 
surface  of  instructed  souls.  "I  believe  in  God  the  Holy 
Ghost,"  must  be  the  innermost  exulting  creed  of  every 
Sunday-school  teacher.  Prayer,  and  nothing  but  prayer, 
gives  wings  to  the  mind,  fire  to  the  will,  tenderness  to  the 
heart.  Indeed,  to  know  what  we  have  to  do  and  to  do  it ;  to 
know  what  God  has  to  do  and  to  leave  Him  to  do  it,  is  the 
first  secret  to  be  mastered  by  the  servants  of  His  kingdom, 
and  usually  the  last  that  they  come  to  learn.  There  is  the 
reaping,  sometimes  of  that  which  we  have  ourselves  sown, 
more  often  of  what  others  before  us  have  sown,  in  part  here 
before  we  die,  in  part  hereafter  when  we  are  summoned  to 
judgment,  which  is  in  measure  given  to  all  true  workers, 
not  always  when  they  wish  for  it,  but  when  God  sees  they 
need  it,  with  the  sense  of  acceptance  and  the  joy  of  progress. 
It  is  varied  and  sometimes  hard  to  analyze,  at  the  best 
partial  and  liable  to  after-disappointments.  Without  some- 
thing of  it  the  jaded  heart  would  sink  under  an  intolerable 
depression.  With  too  much  of  it  we  should  soon  come  to 
think  ourselves  indispensable.  Self-love,  ever  ready  at  a 
moment's  notice  to  assert  itself,  might  be  perilessly  indulged 
at  the  cost  of  Christ's  honour. 

II.  The  conditions  which  it  imposes  are  three.  They 
are  genuineness,  skilfulness,  and  faith.  The  seed  must  be 
genuine  :  wheat ,  not  bastard  wheat ;  the  wheat  that  makes 
bread  and  sustains  life— the  seed  of  the  Word  of  God.  Not 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


8/ 


all  seed  sown  in  Sunday  schools,  just  as  not  all  seed 
scattered  from  Christian  pulpits,  is  unadulterated  truth  of 
God.  While  there  must  always  be  the  human  element  in 
the  teaching  of  the  inspired  Word,  it  must  not  be  all  the 
human  element,  which  it  is  too  often  found  to  be,  whereby 
much  of  the  teaching  given  in  our  Sunday  schools  is,  for 
all  higher  and  divine  purposes,  not  bread,  but  sawdust.  If 
God  is  not  honoured  and  recognized  in  the  exact,  reverent, 
lucid,  and  penetrating  explanation  of  His  Holy  Word,  the 
children,  though  interested  by  attractive  story-telling,  will 
not  be  won  by  the  presentation  of  divine  truth.  They  may 
listen  to  their  teacher,  which  is  good  as  far  as  it  goes ;  but 
they  will  not  be  brought  to  Christ.  It  is  to  His  Word,  and 
His  W^ord  only,  that  the  promise  is  given,  that  it  shall 
accomplish  the  thing  whereto  He  sent  it.  Other  things 
may  please,  but  this  alone  converts.  In  its  fullest  and 
deepest,  in  no  emotional  and  sensational  meaning,  we  long 
to  win  these  children  to  their  Saviour.  We  must  never 
forget  that  it  is  the  engrafted  Word  which  is  able  to  save 
our  souls,  and  this  engrafted  Word  they  must  receive  at 
your  hands. 

Another  condition  is  skilfulness  ;  and  skilfulness  comes 
through  self-culture  and  experience.  Dr.  Johnson  once 
said,  ''Genius  is  nothing  more  than  knowing  the  use  of 
tools ; "  but  there  must  be  tools  for  it  to  use.  A  trained 
mind,  a  ready  and  retentive  memory,  insight  into  character, 
and  an  immense  love,  are  vital  to  a  considerable  success. 
!My  brothers  and  sisters,  in  this  blessed  enterprise  for  Christ, 
bear  with  me,  while  I  say  to  you,  what  I  am  persuaded  your 
inmost  conscience  will  secretly  ratify,  that  you  have  no  right 
to  accept  the  trust,  or  share  the  responsibility  of  this  great 
duty,  unless  you  are  willing,  honestly  willing,  according  to 


88 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


your  several  opportunities — which  in  some  cases  are  ample 
and  admirable — to  qualify  yourselves  for  your  work.  It  is 
not  easy  work,  though  it  is  very  honourable  ;  and  it  is  not 
the  only  way  of  working  to  which  Christ  summons  His  elect. 
There  are  so  many  things  you  need,  not  always  seen  or 
appreciated  as  they  deserve  to  be.  You  will  never  get 
them  all ;  no  one  has  them  all.  Many  you  may  hope  to 
get,  though  not  instantly.  Some  you  must  get,  or  not  only 
will  the  work  be  much  better  without  you — who  in  such  a 
case,  though  without  knowing  it,  will  be  only  usurping  the 
place  of  others  who  might  do  it  better — but  you  yourselves 
would  be  better  without  it,  since,  if  badly  or  too  imperfectly 
done,  it  may  some  day  be  your  grievous  shame.  There 
must  be  a  personal,  loving,  exact  study  of  the  Bible,  for 
your  own  soul's  sake,  if  you  would  have  anything  worth 
knowing  to  pass  on  to  others.  There  must  be  some 
capacity,  however  little  to  begin  with,  not  only  for  acquiring, 
but  also  for  imparting  knowledge.  As  a  rule,  I  suspect, 
though  practice  unspeakably  improves  it,  the  gift  of  teach- 
ing is  mostly  born  with  us.  There  must  be  a  knowledge 
of  character,  and  a  faculty  of  discrimination,  and  a  vivid 
appreciation  of  the  separateness  as  well  as  of  the  beautiful- 
ness  of  each  single  soul.  For  it  is  not  so  much  a  net  you 
have  to  cast  over  your  class,  it  is  rather  with  rod  and  line 
that  you  must  angle  for  each  one  of  them ;  and  it  is  much 
easier  to  stand  on  the  bank  of  the  stream,  and  to  drop  your 
bait  into  the  water,  than  to  bring  the  fish  to  land.  There 
must  also  be  an  immense  love  to  cover  manifold  de- 
ficiencies, to  compensate  for  even  grave  mistakes,  and 
make  the  dullest,  ugliest,  stubbornest  child  beautiful  in 
your  eyes  for  the  sake  of  the  Lord  who  bought  it ;  and 
to  make  Christ  Himself  dear  and  beloved  to  you,  for  the 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


89 


great  privilege  wherewith  He  has  honoured  you  in  trusting 
you  with  those  children  to  nurse  for  Him.  From  your 
knees,  where  His  presence  has  solemnized  and  refreshed 
you,  you  will  go  to  your  class,  where  His  grace  will  instruct 
and  sustain  you ;  and  from  your  class  you  will  go  back  to 
your  knees,  there  tenderly  to  plead  for  them  by  name,  that 
He  will  accept  from  you  and  bless  to  them  the  Word  you 
have  tried  to  sow  in  their  hearts.  Such  intercession  will  fill 
you  with  quiet  and  blessed  happiness.  It  will  make  you 
feel  that  they  are  as  safe  with  Him  as  love  can  wish  them 
to  be  ;  and  that  you  are  as  much  accepted  by  Him  as 
mercy  and  righteousness  mingling  together  can  make  you  to 
be.  When  the  full  assurance  of  a  simple  and  unhesitating 
faith  has  encouraged  you  (as  with  the  steady,  unbroken 
swing  of  the  husbandman's  arm)  to  sow  before  you,  and 
around  you,  as  the  path  of  His  providence  directs,  you 
will  not  too  much  observe  the  hard  and  beaten  impene- 
trableness  of  one  spirit,  or  the  facile  mobility  of  another, 
or  the  chilly  mundane  tendencies  of  another.  You  will 
teach  all,  for  all  are  given  you  to  teach;  hope  for  all, 
since  all  belong  to  God.  If  doubts  arise,  you  will  not 
be  much  disturbed  by  them  ;  if  fears  ruffle  you,  you  will 
not  be  paralyzed  by  them.  The  kingdom  of  nature  has 
its  magnificent  wastefulness,  and  its  myriad  failures.  In 
the  kingdom  of  grace,  behind  human  effort,  is  sovereign 
righteousness.  Nevertheless,  "him  that  cometh  to  Me  I 
will  in  no  wise  cast  out." 

III.  But  there  are  risks  which  the  seed  encounters  ; 
risks  which  you  must  bravely  face  and  steadily  reckon 
with;  risks  which  you  must  not  presume  to  despise  in  a 
shallow  buoyancy,  nor  to  exaggerate  in  a  still  more 
unworthy  despair.    First,  there  is  the  incessant  malevolent 


go 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


presence  and  activity  of  that  evil  spirit,  whose  assaults 
our  Lord  personally  encountered,  whose  designs  He 
solemnly  iinfathomed,  whose  snares  He  so  distinctly  ex- 
posed. "  Those  by  the  wayside  are  they  that  hear.  Then 
Cometh  the  devil,  and  taketh  away  the  Word  out  of  their 
hearts,  lest  they  should  believe  and  be  saved. ^'  My  friends, 
the  question  of  questions — again  and  again  coming  up  in 
manifold  forms— is  this  :  Did  Christ  know,  or  did  He  not 
know,  what  He  thus  spoke  about?  If  He  did  not  know, 
and  so  warned  us  against  an  imaginary  danger,  told  us  of  a 
spiritual  enemy  who  has  no  existence  but  in  the  super- 
stitious dreams  of  an  exploded  Rabbinism,  we  are  welcome 
to  such  comfort  as  is  to  be  had  in  the  consciousness  of  an 
enlightenment  to  which  the  Bible  is  a  stranger — with  this 
result  :  that  if  in  such  a  matter  as  this  Jesus  was  a  Teacher 
who  could  not  teach.  He  may  also  be  a  Saviour  who  cannot 
save.  If  we  cannot  trust  Him  for  doctrine,  can  we  go  to 
Him  for  life  ?  If  He  did  know,  and  told  us  what  He  knew 
for  our  correction  and  instruction  in  righteousness,  let  us 
listen  to  Him  and  heed  His  words,  and  humbly  watch 
against  the  snares  of  the  devil. ^  The  special  peril  against 
which  our  Lord  warns  us  here  is,  I  suppose,  chiefly- 
incidental  to  careless  and  shallow  souls.  The  way  in 
which  the  foe  works  is  by  the  weakening,  chilling,  dis- 
sipating of  good  impressions  before  they  have  had  time  to 
take  form  and  substance  in  the  soul,  by  silly  words  or 
frivolous  diversion,  or  even  actual  sin.  You  who  are  in 
charge  of  these  children,  be  not  ignorant  of  his  devices. 
Make  rules,  and  see  to  the  keeping  of  them,  to  anticipate 
and  prevent  such  mischiefs.  Have  your  eyes  and  ears 
open,  and  protect  your  young  disciples  from  themselves. 
^  "  The  True  Life,"  p.  42. 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


91 


Rely  on  it,  there  is  no  work  which  the  great  enemy  of  souls 
hates  more  than  this  one  of  teaching  the  young  the  gospel 
of  Christ.  There  is  nothing  he  dreads  more  than  that  in  the 
freshness  and  innocence  of  childhood  they  should  come  to 
love  Him. 

Another  peril  is  in  the  nature  of  those  whom  you  would 
win  ;  and  on  either  of  two  sides  of  it,  the  emotional  or  the 
earthly.  Of  all  woeful  and  far-reaching  blunders,  none  is 
more  woeful,  more  disastrous,  more  common,  than  the 
incessant  stimulating  of  the  religious  feelings,  which  pre- 
sently come  to  be  chilled,  blunted,  even  hardened,  until  the 
most  precious  and  important  of  all  our  sensibiUties  become 
impervious  either  to  holy  appeals  or  loving  persuasion,  and 
the  heart,  made  like  cold  and  black  scoriae  in  a  burnt-out 
volcano,  no  longer  can  grow  end  blossom  with  the  truth  of 
Christ.  To  stir  a  child's  tears  is  an  easy,  and  a  cheap,  and 
often  a  selfish  triumph ;  but  is  dearly  bought  at  the  risk  of 
a  child's  soul. 

There  is  also  the  peril  coming  from  the  home  environ- 
ment— the  atmosphere  in  which  the  child  breathes  its 
daily  existence,  and  in  which  unconsciously,  insensibly, 
inevitably,  it  is  matured  for  responsible  life.  To  lift  up 
its  ideal,  to  counteract  its  temptations,  to  help  it  to  live  for 
both  worlds,  to  penetrate  and  transfigure  its  moral  nature 
with  the  fear  and  love  of  an  invisible  Lord — what  a  noble 
aim  is  this,  and  what  a  lofty  duty,  and  what  an  incessant 
but  divine  struggle !  You  are  fellow-workers  with  God. 
You  must  suffer,  if  you  are  true  workmen.  If  you  love, 
you  cannot  help  suffering.  But  in  proportion  as  you  suffer 
now  shall  you  reap  presently.  "  They  that  sow  in  tears 
shall  reap  in  joy."  The  atmosphere,  in  school  at  least, 
which  you  would  have  the  children  breathe,  is  the  atmo- 


92 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


sphere  you  must  yourselves  bring  with  you.  The  life  you 
would  have  them  live  must  be  made  possible,  actual, 
beautiful,  by  the  life  you  are  seen  and  felt  to  be  living 
yourselves.  For  it  is  not  only  abstract  truth  that  wins,  it 
is  truth  permeated,  illuminated,  and  vitalized  by  character ; 
and  character,  Christian  character,  is  the  measure  of  the 
fulness  with  which  Christ  possesses  the  soul. 

There  is  one  more  peril — I  will  only  touch  on  it — the 
peril  which  is  created  by  yourselves.  No  wise  man  will 
dispute  its  existence,  no  good  man  will  make  light  of  its 
gravity,  no  humble  man  but  will  instantly  fear  for  himself. 
In  the  profound  figure  of  the  parable,  as  I  have  already 
hinted,  and  by  an  inevitable  law  of  the  spiritual  world, 
every  man  and  woman  in  it  is  both  the  sower  who  sows 
and  the  seed  which  is  sown.  The  peril  I  touch  on  now 
is  that  which  comes  either  from  an  imperfect  sense  of 
responsibility,  or  from  a  one-sided  view  of  duty,  or  from  a 
morbid  self-distrust,  or  from  a  specious  self-esteem.  Either 
to  treat  these  children  as  if  they  were  toys  to  be  played 
with,  or  as  machines  to  be  wound  up  and  set  going,  and 
then  left  to  themselves,  as  if  they  were  all  mind  and  needed 
nothing  but  facts  and  doctrines;  or  as  if  they  were  all 
emotion,  and  so  did  not  require  to  be  taught  to  know 
and  think;  worst  of  all,  that  this  duty,  w^hich  should  be 
thoroughly  and  constantly  to  fertilize  the  very  springs  of 
the  invisible  life  with  the  mind  and  Word  of  God,  should 
be  lightly  and  easily  undertaken,  not  for  salvation,  but 
for  pastime,  and  so  not  thought  worth  the  pains  and  time 
for  real  preparation — here  are  risks  indeed.  "Take  heed 
unto  thyself  and  to  the  doctrine,"  wrote  St.  Paul  to  his 
son  in  the  faith;  and  "  thyself "  comes  before  "  doctrine." 
That  exhortation  I  pass  on  to  you,  my  friends,  in  the 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


93 


name  of  our  Master  Christ.  The  life  behind  the  message, 
the  message  accentuated  by  the  Hfe,  the  Ufe  hidden  with 
Christ  in  God,  must  be  the  unfailing,  unchanging  secret 
of  all  your  blessed  labour. 

IV.  Once  more,  there  are  the  wages  that  it  claims,  as 
our  Lord  said  to  the  disciples  at  Sychar  :  "  He  that  reapcth 
receiveth  wages,  and  gathereth  fruit  unto  life  eternal,  that 
both  he  that  soweth  and  he  that  reapeth  may  rejoice 
together." 

Whatever  may  be  the  harvest  which  you  will  be  per- 
mitted to  reap  now,  in  the  sense  of  visible  results,  and 
garnered  success,  and  souls  laid  to  sleep  in  the  Lord  to 
be  your  crown  when  He  comes  back;  or  souls  fruitful  in 
activities  for  Him,  which  by  His  grace  you  have  helped 
to  repent,  and  believe,  and  love,  and  work— of  your  wages 
you  may  be  quite  sure ;  and  you  will  all  of  you  be  receiv- 
ing more  than  you  think  of,  in  human  love,  in  personal 
blessing,  in  accumulated  and  digested  truth. 

The  love  of  these  children,  with  their  bright  welcome, 
their  sunny  smile,  their  often  delicate  thoughtful  affection, 
their  tender  sympathy — is  there,  can  there  be  a  blesseder 
recompense  under  the  sun  than  this  ?  It  is  the  reward  God 
asks  from  us ;  and  it  is  the  only  one  He  cares  for,  since 
it  impHes  and  contains  and  ensures  everything  else.  To 
desire  love  is  the  divine  nature.  To  receive  love  is  the 
divine  reward.  Moreover,  when  they  love  you,  you  have 
the  best  evidence  that  you  are  succeeding  with  them. 
When  they  have  once  begun  really  to  love  you,  they 
may  be  more  than  half-way  towards  loving  Christ.  Then 
your  own  personal  life,  in  the  stirring,  and  deepening,  and 
widening  of  it,  through  the  sacrifices  you  accept  and  the 
devotions  you  offer,  is  itself  an  unspeakable  reward.  It 


94 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


is  a  law  of  the  spiritual  world  that  to  help  others  is  to 
be  helped  by  others ;  and  if  the  highest  distinction  we 
can  receive  for  doing  one  duty  is  immediately  to  be 
offered  a  second,  to  be  made  more  like  Christ  is  the 
surest  mark  of  His  grace.  Nay,  even  in  the  simplest 
teaching  to  the  youngest  and  most  ignorant  (always  by 
the  way  the  hardest),  if  only  our  teaching  is  intelligent 
and  careful,  well  thought  out  and  sincere,  we  may  find  a 
very  precious  and  important  discipline  to  our  own  under- 
standing in  the  apprehension  and  assimilation  of  divine 
truth.  Unto  every  one  which  hath  shall  be  given."  To 
share  our  possessions  is  to  double  them ;  and  truth  is  a 
possession,  not  to  be  covetously  hoarded,  but  to  be  eagerly 
passed  on. 

In  conclusion,  let  us  remember — 

I.  The  iiidesiriiciibleness  of  truth.  As  some  of  you,  my 
older  friends,  look  back  over  a  long  tract  of  years  in  which 
the  Sunday  school  has  had  a  great  place  in  your  heart  and 
a  large  share  of  your  time,  not  without  a  certain  pathos 
asking  yourselves,  "  How  many  of  the  thousands  of  lessons 
which  I  have  carefully  prepared  and  cheerfully  given  will 
bring  forth  fruit  when  the  King  comes  back  to  take  account 
of  His  servants?"  doubt  not,  but  earnestly  believe,  that  if 
"  long  sleeps  the  summer  in  the  seed,"  the  summer  is  in  the 
seed,  if  the  seed  sown  by  you  is  indeed  the  Word  of  God ; 
and  even  now  it  may  be  shining  and  ripening  in  many  a 
changed  heart  passed  far  out  of  your  reach  and  ken.  The 
sailor  keeping  watch  on  the  midnight  sea,  praying  as  he 
watches;  the  miner  toiling  for  gold  in  some  Queensland 
gully,  and  thinking  of  the  better  treasure  in  the  heavenly 
country  towards  which,  by  words  of  yours,  his  feet  are 
moving ;  the  shepherd  among  the  wooded  valleys  of  New 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


95 


Zealand,  saying  over  to  himself  the  Shepherd's  Psalm  taught 
him  by  you ;  the  settler's  wife,  in  some  rude  cabin  on  the 
Pacific  slope,  training  her  children  as  you  trained  her,  may, 
without  your  knowing  it,  have  found  the  pearl  of  great  price, 
which  but  for  you  they  would  never  have  found ;  through 
you,  also,  may  be  helping  others  to  find  it.  You  are  the 
servants  of  Him  who  cannot  fail,  whether  in  truth,  fulness, 
or  power.  "Heaven  and  earth  shall  pass  away;  but  My 
Words  shall  not  pass  away." 

2.  Be  assured  of  the  sufficie?icy  of  grace.  All  of  you 
who  are  true  will  from  time  to  time  have  your  moods  of 
depression,  your  seasons  of  disappointment,  it  may  be,  your 
moments  of  despair.  Christ  Himself  once  said,  when  His 
hearers  were  forsaking  Him,  "  Will  ye  also  go  away  ? " 
The  great  apostle,  when  he  prayed  thrice  that  the  thorn 
in  the  flesh  might  be  removed,  had  for  his  answer,  and  he 
was  abundantly  satisfied  with  it,  "  My  grace  is  sufficient 
for  Thee;  for  ;My  strength  is  made  p'erfect  in  weakness." 

"  The  river  of  God  is  full  of  water,"  and  it  is  full  for 
you.  Each  one  of  you,  and  all  of  you  together,  will  never 
drink  it  dry,  even  for  a  moment.  Nay,  our  sin  is  in  this, 
that  we  will  not  drink  enough  of  it.  Let  him  that  is  athirst 
come,  and  I  will  give  him  to  drink  of  the  water  of  life 
freely.  This  is  the  great  message  I  would  leave  with  you 
now.  To  feel  the  thirst,  and  to  be  willing  to  be  made  to 
feel  it,  is  the  first  necessity ;  then  to  ask  and  to  receive,  that 
our  joy  may  be  full. 

3.  My  last  word  shall  be  on  the  joy  of  harvest.  There 
can  be  no  reaping  without  sowing,  and  there  will  be  no 
harvest  without  joy ;  and  that  joy  will  be  so  noble,  so  holy, 
so  unselfish,  so  divine.  Joy  among  the  angels  of  God,  joy 
in  the  heart  of  the  crowned  Jesus,  joy  to  the  Father  when 


96 


THE  SOWER  AND  THE  SEED. 


He  sees  His  Son  glorified,  joy  to  the  husbandman  when  he 
gathers  the  sheaves  into  his  barn. 

My  friends,  whom  I  greet  in  the  Lord,  and  love  in  the 
Lord,  this  one  question  I  leave  with  you.  It  touches  your 
eternity,  and  much  hangs  on  it  and  it  hangs  on  much.  It 
hangs  on  your  secret  motive  of  duty,  on  your  personal  and 
supreme  aim,  on  the  measure  of  your  sacrifices,  on  the  quality 
of  your  diligence,  on  the  constancy  of  your  prayers.  When 
the  Lord,  whom  you  serve,  comes  back  in  the  end  of  the 
days  to  take  account  of  His  servants  and  to  make  up  His 
jewels,  w4iat  think  you — in  your  heart  of  hearts — will  your 
harvest  be  ? 


DETERIORATION. 


H— 15 


"  Character  is  ceaselessly  marching,  even  when  \\c  seem  lo  liave  sunk 
into  a  fixed  and  stagnant  mood." 


DETERIORATION. 


PnacJied  al  Half-way  Tree  Pan's h  Church,  Jamaica,  March  31,  18S6. 

In  the  sliip  mending  their  nets." — Mark  i.  19. 

Slxh  is  the  inevitable  employment  of  diligent  men.  For 
"inevitable,"  I  might  indeed  have  substituted  "necessary." 
For  how  could  nets  be  used  if  there  were  holes  in  them  ? 
The  careless  fisherman,  who  will  not  repair  the  tools  of 
his  craft,  may  save  himself  the  pains  of  handling  them. 
"  Diligent,"  too ;  for  if  the  hot  and  languid  hours  of  noon 
were  spent  in  acUvity  instead  of  in  repose,  we  may  see  how 
the  best  recreation  of  duty  is  in  the  variety  of  it ;  and 
that  while  the  lazy  or  feeble  workman  quickly  finds  excuses 
for  the  rest  which  he  has  hardly  earned,  the  true  and 
typical  toiler  will  not  even  think  of  his  repose  until  his 
next  work  is  ready. 

Every  miracle  suggests  a  parable,  and  every  gospel 
incident  conceals  a  philosophy. 

So,  I  say,  let  us  mend  our  nets.  First,  however,  let  us 
clearly  understand  what  our  nets  are,  and  the  use  we  are  to 
make  of  them,  and  the  conditions  essential  to  a  use  which 
shall  be  at  once  fruitful  and  permanent.  Also  that,  good  as 
they  may  be,  the  more  we  use  them,  the  more  we  shall 
see  them  to  need  mending ;  and  that  what  Dean  Church 


100 


DETERIORATION. 


lias  so  beautifully  called  "  the  inward  discipline  of  the  soul," 
is  absolutely  essential  to,  must  ever  be  the  hidden  con- 
comitant of,  its  moral  and  spiritual  activities. 

I.  What  are  our  nets?  This,  I  think.  The  separate, 
distinct  personality  of  each  human  being,  in  the  joint 
totality  of  body,  soul,  and  spirit.  It  implies,  also,  that 
subtle,  undefinable,  yet  most  potent  atmosphere,  which  is 
continually  being  generated  by  the  invisible  forces  of  its 
existence  under  the  circumstances  which  surround  it,  and 
which  we  recognize  under  the  word  "  character." 

We  are  our  nets.  Man,  and  especially  a  Christian 
man,  is  himself  pre-eminently  the  organ  or  instrument  of 
all  his  activities  in,  or  influences  on,  the  world ;  other  tools 
that  he  may  use  are  subservient  to  this  supreme  one, 
and  depend  in  their  potency  on  the  will  and  motive  and 
power  that  handle  them.  The  man  is  his  work,  and  his 
personality  is  his  primary  instrument  in  it;  and  it  never 
can  be  better  or  higher  than  what  he  himself  is. 

This  being  so,  how  important  it  becomes  that  each  of 
us  should  recognize  what  he  is  sent  into  the  world  for,  and 
what  this  fishing  with  his  net  must  mean  !  "  The  chief 
end  of  man  is  to  glorify  God,  and  to  enjoy  Him  for  ever." 
Each  of  us  has  come  here  to  work  out  his  own  salvation, 
and  to  help  his  neighbour  to  work  out  his.  We  are  to 
be  salt  and  light.  W^e  who  are  baptized  into  Christ's 
body,  are  to  recognize  our  fellowship  with  its  members ; 
baptized  into  His  death,  we  must  crucify  the  flesh ;  into 
His  resurrection,  we  must  walk  in  newness  of  life. 

There  can  be  no  recognition  of  our  duty  to  our  neighbour 
unless  there  is  first  an  apprehension  of  our  relation  to  God. 
When  wc  have  truly  repented  of  sin,  and  taken  it  to  the 
precious  blood  that  it  may  be  washed  away;  when  we 


DETERIORATION. 


lOI 


have  come  to  know  and  believe  the  love  that  God  hath  to 
us,  and,  beholding  Him  at  once  our  revealed  and  reconciled 
Father  in  Christ,  walk  with  Him  in  conscious  and  filial 
fellowship ;  when  we  recognize  that,  being  no  longer  our 
own,  but  being  bought  with  a  price,  we  are  to  glorify  Him 
in  our  body  and  in  our  spirit,  which  are  His;  when  we 
discover  that  personal  goodness  is  to  be  the  one  aim  of 
the  Christian,  and  that  the  secret  of  this  goodness  is  to 
come  at  once  from  human  effort  and  supernatural  grace  ; 
also  when  we  appreciate  the  wisdom  and  blessedness  cf 
using  special  helps,  and  holy  seasons,  and  quiet  discipline, 
and  cheerful  sacrifice,  if  we  would  grow  much  like  our 
Lord,  and  live  in  the  sunshine  of  His  face; — then  the  key 
to  the  secret  of  understanding  Jesus  Christ  will  be  in  our 
hand  :  we  shall  follow  on  to  know  the  Lord. 

II.  What  are  we  to  understand  by  our  nets  needing  to 
be  mended  ? 

1.  The  body  comes,  through  mere  force  of  habit,  and 
the  daily  necessity  of  our  obeying  its  imperious  claims,  to 
exercise  a  kind  of  tyramiy  over  us ;  and  to  get  more  of  its 
own  way  than  it  ought.  "  All  things  are  lawful  for  me,  but 
all  things  are  not  expedient.  All  things  are  lawful  for  me, 
but  I  will  not  be  brought  under  the  power  of  any."  The 
body  needs  its  periods  of  mending.  This  is  one  of  them. 
It  may  also,  of  course,  mean  those  recuperative  and  invigo- 
rating processes  whereby  we  supply  the  continual  waste  of 
vital  force,  healing  sickness,  or  contriving  rest. 

2.  The  understanding  also  has  its  similar  necessities  of 
restoration  and  repair,  and  not  least  in  that  dominion  of 
truth  for  which  a  Christian  teacher  feels  special  responsi- 
bility— revealed  truth.  The  mind  is  apt  to  let  go,  in  lapse 
of  years,  truths  it  once  loved  and  lived  by;  or  it  becomes 


102 


DETERIORATION. 


obscured  in  matters  where  light  means  life,  certainly  power ; 
or  it  finds  in  front  of  it  a  great  undiscovered  land  of  pro- 
found verities,  which  through  carelessness  or  indolence  it 
has  never  yet  approached  to  learn  and  to  cherish  and  to  use. 

3.  Then  the  moral  nature  needs  caring  for  and  looking 
into  as  well.  Self  grows  on  us  with  a  fatal  and  rapid  stealthi- 
ness.  Temper  becomes  sharp,  or  arrogant,  or  feebly  peevish. 
Faults  of  indolence  and  personal  indulgence  will  soon  grow 
in  soil  congenial  to  them.  To  abide  in  love  is  to  abide  in 
God,  and  to  cultivate  love  is  to  follow  God ;  but  to  love  as 
God  loves,  or  as  we  wish  others  to  love  us,  will  not  come  by 
sighing  after  it.  It  is  the  work  of  God  co-operating  with 
the  effort  of  man. 

Once  more,  there  is  our  spiritual  life — that  upper  region 
of  our  conscious  moral  existence,  in  which  we  recognize 
God,  feel  after  Him,  commune  with  Him,  listen  to  His 
voice,  try  to  be  conformed  to  His  image,  and  rejoice  in  the 
shining  of  His  face. 

But  how  much  our  nets  need  mending  here  !  High  and 
glowing  resolves  cool  down.  Faults  which  we  used  to 
struggle  against  we  are  tempted  to  treat  as  inevitable. 
Prayer  becomes  dull,  short,  distracted,  wanting  in  detail, 
not  looked  forward  to,  not  cherished  in  the  heart  when  it 
is  done.  We  have  less  personal  sympathy  with  Christ's 
redeeming  work  in  the  world,  less  real  interest  in  those 
who  are  foremost  in  the  doing  of  it ;  the  horizon  of  hope 
is  lowered  when  joy  goes  out  of  our  religion ;  and  peace 
soon  follows  it.  Our  silver  becomes  dross,  our  wine  is 
mixed  with  water. 

III.  Yes,  the  nets  need  mending  ;  but  how  is  the  mend- 
ing to  be  done  ? 

First,  there  should  be  an  honest,  thorough,  courageous 


DETERIORATION. 


103 


searching  of  the  heart  as  in  the  presence  of  God,  and  with 
His  help,  that  we  may  know  where  our  shortcomings  lie,  and 
confess  them,  and  then  strive  to  remedy  and  repair  them. 

Self-knowledge  is  often  keenly  painful,  and  it  does  not 
grow  easier  as  we  grow  older ;  and  we  are  all  too  apt  to 
wrap  ourselves  in  the  thick  mantle  of  self-love,  through 
which  the  searching  air  of  the  world's  criticism  fails  to  make 
its  way.  But  pain  is  better  than  death,  and  to  be  past 
feeling  means  paralysis. 

Then  it  is  real  loss  and  grave  peril  to  the  soul  that  we 
should  become  cloudy  and  confused  about  the  doctrines  of 
grace.  For  ideas  are  the  true  motors  of  all  that  is  highest 
within  us,  and  the  doctrines  of  the  gospel  are  the  thoughts  of 
God.  What  baptism  means  for  us ;  what  Holy  Communion 
gives  to  faithful  souls  drawing  near  to  receive  their  Lord ; 
the  exact  place  and  function  of  faith  in  the  soul's  appre- 
hension of  Christ  and  eternal  life  ;  how  Christ's  death 
expiates  sin,  and  satisfies  the  claims  of  the  divine  righteous- 
ness ; — these  are  matters  which  touch  our  life  and  our 
motives,  our  aims  and  our  conduct ;  and  it  does  matter 
what  we  think  we  are  really  holding  of  them,  unless  the 
creeds  themselves  are  but  fragments  of  exploded  specula- 
tion, and  some  of  St.  Paul's  profoundest  Epistles  might  as 
well  never  have  been  penned. 

In  our  moral  life  and  character,  while  generally  aiming 
at  the  raising  of  the  whole  level  of  its  consistent  goodness, 
we  should  take  special  note  of  our  besetting  faults.  Each 
knows  his  own  ;  if  he  needs  to  be  told  them,  friends  are  at 
his  side  who  can  do  it.  The  best  thing  is  to  ask  God  to  do 
it.  He  is  so  gentle,  and  so  tender,  and  so  true.  It  may  be 
a  habit  of  speaking  ill  of  other  people,  or  at  least  of  depre- 
ciating them.    Make  a  rule  in  the  strength  of  God  to  try 


104 


DETERIORATION. 


not  to  speak  about  them  at  all.  Why  should  you  ?  It  helps 
nobody,  and  it  hurts  many.  Or  is  it  a  habit  of  selfishness? 
Then  every  day  try  once  at  least  to  surrender  your  will  to 
some  one  else,  and  in  a  matter  about  which  you  really  care. 
Are  you  lazy  ?  Get  up  earlier.  Does  your  thriftiness  border 
on  covetousness  ?  Give  more  ;  and  not  only  as  a  duty,  also 
as  a  joy.  Is  quickness  or  moroseness  of  temper  your  fault? 
Strive  against  this,  for  it  grieves  God.  Ask  Him  to  pour 
His  love  into  your  hearts,  that  it  may  flow  out  on  your 
neighbour.  Cultivate  sympathy.  Remember  that  "  love  is 
going  out  of  self." 

Once  more,  let  the  flaws  and  fissures  in  our  spiritual 
life  be  healed  by  more  communion  with  God.  Lotus  make 
special  opportunities  for  prayer,  both  private  and  public. 
They  will  help  and  react  on  each  other.  Grace  is  as 
essential  to  goodness  as  effort  is ;  work  is  the  true  comple- 
ment of  faith.  Therefore  let  us  come  to  Christ  for  His 
presence  and  aid  in  the  holy  ordinances  of  cur  religion ; 
and,  above  all  things,  let  us  remember  that  it  is  not  only 
our  own  soul  that  has  to  be  stirred  and  deepened,  but 
other  souls  near  us  and  belonging  to  us.  Let  our  life  have 
its  duties  of  charity  as  well  as  its  offices  of  worship.  Let 
us  live  for  others,  if  we  would  have  God  to  dwell  in  us. 

To  conclude  :  i.  You  may  have  already  recollected  that 
St.  Mark,  in  his  account  of  this  incident,  is  careful  to  relate 
that  they  were  in  the  ship  mending  their  nets,  with  their 
father  Zebedee  and  the  hired  servants.  Our  ship  in  which 
we  mend  our  nets  is  the  Church,  and  it  is  the  best  place  to 
mend  them  in.  But  to  mend  them  together  in  the  gathered 
society  of  the  faithful  stirs  sympathy,  suggests  forbearance, 
and  promotes  intercession.  We  all  err  and  slip  and  fail 
in  turn.    We  all  in  turn  need  the  kindly  forbearance  of  our 


DETERIORATION. 


105 


brethren,  and  the  merciful  indulgence  of  our  Lord.  We 
have  enough  to  do  with  our  own  faults,  instead  of  looking 
at  our  brethren's.  Yet  we  all  alike  need  a  continual  forgive- 
ness. We  all  need  the  mutual  help  and  blessing  that  comes 
to  sinful  but  sincere  children  of  one  heavenly  family,  travel- 
ling together  to  the  many  mansions  of  the  one  celestial 
home,  from  common  prayer  and  praise.  As  you  kneel 
side  by  side  in  the  house  of  prayer,  sometimes  quietly 
think  and  tenderly  pray  for  those  near  you— and  without 
telling  them.  No  help  in  all  this  world  is  like  the  help 
that  comes  by  intercession.    Give  what  you  would  receive. 

Then  mending  our  nets  has,  like  everything  else,  a  subtle 
snare  with  it.  It  may  breed  too  much  introspection,  a 
morbid  brooding  over  tiny  faults,  a  religious  egotism,  even 
a  spiritual  self-complacency.  We  should  tread  upon  all 
these  possible  thorns  with  a  firm  tread ;  we  should  think 
more  of  our  Saviour  than  of  our  sinfulness,  of  His  righteous- 
ness than  of  our  own  unworthiness,  of  what  He  has  done 
for  us  than  of  what  we  can  do  for  Him,  of  His  unchanging 
love  rather  than  of  our  own  poor  effort  after  it.  We  walk 
by  faith,  not  by  sight.  We  are  dead,  and  our  life  is  hid 
with  Christ  in  God. 

Then  there  is  a  sort  of  comfort  in  the  thought  that,  as 
nets  will  wear  out,  so,  in  the  nature  of  things,  these  spirits  of 
ours  need  repair  and  restoration  through  the  very  conditions 
of  their  existence.  Christ,  so  far  from  feeling  these  men  to 
be  but  poor  and  unskilful  at  their  trade,  and  so  unsuited  for 
the  work  to  which  He  was  calling  them,  summoned  them  as 
readily  as  He  summoned  Peter  and  Andrew  a  few  yards  off, 
casting  their  nets  into  the  sea  ;  thought  no  scorn  of  them 
because  they  were  not  actually  at  their  trade.  He  will 
observe  and  approve  and  bless  us  for  mending  our  nets. 


io6 


DETERIORATION. 


He  will  help  us  to  mend  them ;  show  us  where  they  need 
more  mending  than  we  had  thought  of ;  sustain  us  when 
our  patience  fails,  cheer  us  when  our  joy  is  ebbing. 
For  oh,  dear  souls,  what  He  most  desires  for  us  is  that  we 
should  be  partakers  of  His  holiness  ;  and  to  be  saintly  means 
a  long  and  steep  and  thorny,  though  even  more  blessed, 
climb  up  the  hill,  on  the  top  of  which  we  too  shall  be 
transfigured,  just  so  far  and  so  completely  as  we  followed 
Him  closely  here. 

Lastly,  we  mend  our  nets  that  we  may  use  them  again, 
perhaps  in  even  better  and  nobler  work  than  before. 
"  Follow  Me,"  said  Jesus,  "  and  I  Avill  make  you  fishers  of 
men."  Every  sin  conquered,  every  habit  controlled,  every 
virtue  practised,  every  cross  carried,  means  more  goodness, 
and  therefore  more  usefulness.  Goodness  will  live  and 
triumph  when  intellect  and  knowledge,  wealth  and  genius, 
are  utterly  forgotten.  There  is  no  limit  to  our  goodness 
but  such  as  our  own  unbelief  and  indevoutness  are  pleased 
to  put  in  the  way  of  it.  Mending  our  nets  may  be  humble 
work,  but  it  is  useful  work,  and  God  gives  His  Holy  Spirit 
to  them  that  ask  Him. 


TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 


"Money  may  always  be  a  beautiful  thing.    It  is  we  who  make  it 


TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 

Preached  in  Winchester  Cathedral^  Ash  Wednesday,  1892. 

"  Lay  up  for  yourselves  treasures  in  heaven." — Matt.  vi.  20, 

It  has  been  observed  of  our  Lord,  with  as  much  acumen 
as  exactness,  that  it  was  His  rule,  in  His  public  teaching, 
not  so  much  to  stir  emotion  as  to  compel  reflection,  and 
that  He  always  aimed  at  reaching  the  conscience  before 
winning  the  heart.  In  another  way  of  putting  it.  He  care- 
fully avoided,  what  some  of  our  modern  revivalists  appa- 
rently much  desiderate,  any  disturbance  of  the  equilibrium 
of  the  moral  sense  by  artificial  or  premature  stimulating 
of  the  feelings.  It  is,  indeed,  easy  enough,  and,  alas  ! 
perilous,  to  stir  tears  or  to  excite  a  superficial  repentance ; 
but  when  the  reaction  follows — and  there  is  sure  to  be  a 
reaction — the  soul,  with  no  principles  to  sustain  it,  and  no 
knowledge  to  buttress  its  weakness,  is  apt  to  succumb  easily 
to  a  fatal  coldness;  and  so  the  last  state  of  that  man  is 
worse  than  the  first. 

The  text  is  a  good  instance  of  Christ's  method  in  per- 
suading men  into  the  higher  life  of  faith  and  sacrifice.  He 
has  been  discoursing  on  the  three  primary  constituents  of 
religion — almsgiving,  worship,  fasting.   He  does  not,  indeed, 


I  10 


TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 


once  stop  to  argue  their  obligation  or  their  helpfulness. 
That  he  takes  for  granted.  His  teaching  about  all  three  of 
them  is  of  a  precautionary  character,  and  directed  against 
the  characteristic  fault  of  the  time — ostentatiousness.  If 
they  gave  alms,  and  prayed,  and  fasted,  not  because  they 
loved  their  neighbour,  and  thirsted  for  God,  and  wished  to 
discipline  their  own  spirits,  but  to  win  the  praise  of  men,  and 
to  hear  their  neighbours  whisper,  ^'  See  how  good  they  are  !  " 
the  reward  they  coveted  should  Indeed  be  theirs,  for  what 
it  was  v/orth.  But  presently,  when,  at  a  woeful  distance 
from  them,  the  glories  of  the  invisible  world  opened  out 
before  their  eyes,  none  of  these  things  would  be  found  to 
have  followed  them.  Their  money,  their  prayers,  their 
fasting,  would  all  be  seen  to  have  been  quite  thrown  away, 
so  far  as  any  reward  in  heaven  is  concerned — laid  up  on 
earth,  and  therefore  rewarded  there.  Not  to  be  found,  not 
to  be  rewarded,  in  heaven. 

"  Lay  up  for  yourselves  treasures  in  heaven,"  says  our 
Lord ;  appealing^  you  observe,  to  two  supreme  instincts  in 
the  nature  of  man — that  of  forethought  and  that  of  acquisi- 
tiveness. As  if  to  say,  "  Be  not  so  short-sighted  as  to  live 
and  plan  only  for  the  present ;  think  of  eternity,  and  lay  up 
in  that  blessed  home,  which  you  are  wont  to  call  heaven, 
treasures  and  possessions  which  will  be  imperishable,  and 
will  meet  you  after  death,  for  you  to  keep  and  enjoy  for 
ever." 

Two  simple  questions  stand  out  in  front  of  us  here, 
and  our  careful  answers  to  them  ought  in  some  way  to 
help  us  to  turn  our  lives  to  usury. 

1.  What  are  the  treasures  which  we  are  to  lay  up  in 
Heaven  ? 

2.  In  what  does  the  laying  up  consist  ? 


TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 


I.  Now,  the  treasures  which  vre  are  to  lay  up  in  heaven, 
to  be  ready  for  us  when  we  come,  presumably  correspond 
with  the  three  great  duties  of  the  religious  life  already 
enforced  by  our  Lord — may  not  inexactly  be  described  as 
their  outcome  and  result.  Friendship  is  to  be  earned  by 
kindness,  of  which  almsgiving  is  at  least  one  expression  ; 
and  do  not  be  startled  by  what  may  seem  a  bald  way  of 
wording  it,  or  suppose,  in  consequence,  that  almsgiving  is 
the  only  way  of  earning  it.  You  remember  the  closing 
admonition  in  the  parable  of  the  unjust  steward  :  "  Make 
to  yourselves  friends  of  the  mammon  of  unrighteousness ; 
that,  when  ye  fail,  they  may  receive  you  into  everlasting 
habitations."  You  remember,  again,  how,  on  an  occasion 
of  being  bidden  to  a  feast,  the  Lord  said  to  those  who 
bade  Him^  ''When  thou  makest  a  feast,  call  the  poor, 
the  maimed,  the  halt,  the  blind,  and  thou  shalt  be  blessed, 
for  they  cannot  recompense  thee  ;  for  thou  shalt  be  recom- 
pensed at  the  resurrection  of  the  just," 

Once  more,  you  remember  hovr,  in  the  parable  of  the 
last  judgment,  those  on  the  right  hand  answer  the  Judge, 
saying,  "  Lord,  when  saw^  we  Thee  an  hungred,  and  fed 
Thee  ?  or  thirsty,  and  gave  Thee  drink  ?  When  saw  we  Tliee 
a  stranger,  and  took  Thee  in  ?  or  naked,  and  cbthed  Thee? 
.  .  .  And  the  King  shall  answer  and  say  unto  them,  Yerily 
I  say  unto  you.  Inasmuch  as  ye  have  done  it  unto  one  of 
the  least  of  these  My  brethren,  ye  have  done  it  unto  Me." 
Thus  it  is  that  one  treasure,  which  should  meet  us  in 
heaven,  and  which  we  are  to  lay  up  there  now,  which  shall 
be  incorruptible,  and  undefiled,  and  never  fade  away,  is  the 
love  of  grateful  souls.  And,  I  ask,  can  there  be  a  greater, 
a  sweeter,  a  nobler,  or  one  more  divine  ?  There  may  be 
divers  ways  of  earning  that  gratitude — ways  of  body  and 


112 


TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 


spirit,  of  precept  and  example,  of  sympathy  and  counsel, 
of  warning  and  reproof.    The  love  of  wife  and  husband, 
whose  souls  have  grown  into  each  other  by  the  tenderest 
and  deepest  of  associations,  and  which  survives  parting, 
loneliness,  and  death ;  the  love  of  a  child  to  a  parent,  who 
has  trained  and  taught  it ;  the  love  of  a  soul  to  a  pastor, 
who  has  brought  it  to  the  feet  of  Jesus  to  hear  His  Word ; 
the  love  of  an  outcast  to  one  Avho  neither  despised  it  nor 
despaired  of  it,  but  made  a  long  arm  of  love  to  lift  it  out 
of  the  pit,  and  set  its  feet  on  a  rock ;  the  love  of  a  little 
scholar  to  a  Christian  teacher,  who  taught  it  that  God's 
love  was  its  best  possession;  the  love  of  a  strong  friend, 
who  in  a  moment  of  golden  opportunity  dared  to  bring 
Jesus  to  the  searing  conscience  of  a  thoughtless  youth.  My 
brethren,  as  you  anticipate  the  moment  when  the  cloud  lifts, 
and  you  pass  behind  the  veil  to  see  your  Judge,  can  you  count 
on  any  one  likely  to  be  waiting  for  you  at  the  gate,  and 
to  welcome  you  with  the  joy  that  only  the  redeemed  can 
know  ?    Has  it  ever  even  occurred  to  you  that  it  is  your 
duty  as  well  as  your  honour  to  glorify  Christ  by  using 
your  time  and  your  talents  for  His  service — by  acts  of 
charity,  of  course,  and  deeds  of  sacrifice,  but  also  by  words 
which  move,  and  by  example  which  inspires  ?    For  alms- 
giving does  not  only  mean  the  giving  of  money.    It  may 
or  may  not  be  yours  to  say  with  the  apostle,  "  Silver  and 
gold  have  I  none."    It  is  love  that  gives  just  what  it  has  to 
give — of  courtesy,  of  sympathy,  of  friendship,  and  prayers. 
We  are  each  sent  into  this  world,  not  feebly  to  complain 
of  its  badness,  but  manfully  to  try  to  make  it  better ;  not 
to  be  overcome  of  evil,  but  to  overcome  evil  with  good. 
"  Pure  religion  "and  undefiled  before  God  and  the  Father 
is  this,  To  visit  the  fatherless  and  widows  in  their  affliction, 


TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 


113 


and  to  keep  himself  unspotted  from  the  world."  The 
question  should  surely  come  home  to  us — In  what  way 
are  we  doing  this,  if  indeed  we  are  doing  it  at  all  ? 

Another  treasure  which  we  are  to  lay  up  in  heaven  is 
knowledge,  and,  of  all  kinds  of  knowledge,  the  best,  and 
the  most  profound,  and  the  most  satisfying,  and  the  most 
dignifying — the  knowledge  of  God  in  Christ ;  that  know- 
ledge which  is  eternal  life,  and  which  grows  and  matures 
through  prayer. 

Two  questions  you  may  reasonably  interpose  here. 
One  is,  how  is  it  possible  to  conceive  of  our  imperfect 
human  knowledge  as  in  any  sense  or  degree  a  permanent 
or  substantial  treasure,  which  we  shall  not  so  much  meet 
again  as  actually  take  with  us,  out  of  a  world  of  shadows 
into  the  world  of  realities ;  from  a  place  where  we  speak  as 
children,  and  understand  as  children,  and  think  as  chil- 
dren, and  know  but  in  part,  to  a  place  where  childish 
things  will  be  put  away,  and  we  shall  know  even  as  we  are 
known? 

Surely,  however,  it  is  quite  reasonable  to  suppose,  not 
only  that  the  laws  of  the  human  mind  are  eternal  and 
immutable,  and  that  they  will  continue  to  operate  in  the  life 
to  come,  though  unhampered  by  the  restrictions  which  now 
fetter  them,  and  under  new  conditions  which  will  give  wings 
to  thought,  and  perhaps  altogether  substitute  intuition  for 
reason.  Also  that,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  the  knowledge  we 
possess,  though  scanty  and  fragmentary,  yet  if  solid  as  far 
as  it  goes,  only  waits  for  new  environments  and  enfranchised 
faculties  to  be  deepened  and  widened  and  matured.  It  is 
certain  that  all  mental  cultivation,  if  only  for  the  sake  of 
the  discipline  that  goes  with  it,  must  be  an  acquisition  in 
the  sense  of  those  final  results  on  which  death  can  make 


114 


TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 


no  real  impression.  The  incessant  accumulating  stock  of 
knowledge  of  the  best  and  highest  things  will,  I  suppose, 
be  one  of  the  loftiest  occupations  of  the  seons  in  front, 
infinite  in  its  scope,  and  elevating  in  its  processes.  Let 
no  one  think  that  honest  study  of  any  kind  is  waste. 

Surely,  if  the  works  of  God  sought  out  of  all  them  that 
have  pleasure  therein  declare  His  glory,  and  manifest  His 
handiwork,  it  is  His  mind.  His  person,  His  nature.  His  pur- 
pose, that  it  most  helps  us  to  know,  and  that  in  proportion 
to  our  knowledge  of  them  convey  to  us  eternal  life.  What 
He  is,  what  He  thinks,  what  He  desires,  what  He  forbids, 
in  the  perfection  of  His  glorious  attributes,  in  the  revelation 
of  His  eternal  purpose,  the  angels  desire  to  look  into; 
but  the  Church  is  privileged  to  possess  the  word  of  the 
Incarnate  Son. 

If  you  ask  what  prayer  has  to  do  with  knowledge,  in  the 
sense  of  helping  us  to  lay  it  up  as  a  treasure  in  heaven, 
I  answer — Much  every  way.  Prayer,  with  all  knowledge  that 
touches  God,  vitalizes  and  solemnizes  and  deepens  it.  It 
helps  us  to  see  His  face,  and  to  hear  His  voice,  and  to  feel 
His  presence,  and  to  touch  His  hand.  It  helps  us  to  know 
that  He  is  our  Father.  It  reveals  sin,  and  it  proclaims 
pardon;  it  indicates  the  mystery  of  evil,  and  it  shows  us 
the  way  to  escape  from  its  awful  power.  I  do  not  say  that 
the  habit  or  spirit  of  prayer  is  essential  to  all  knowledge ; 
I  do  say,  that  where  there  is  no  sense  of  God,  no  spiritual 
contact  with  the  invisible  world,  the  deepest  part  of  this 
wonderful  nature  is  ignored,  and  its  necessities  denied,  and 
its  loftiest  aspirations  crushed,  and  in  the  end  there  is  a 
spiritual  indifference,  which  robs  the  soul  of  its  true  noble- 
ness, and  a  deterioration  of  the  moral  sense  which  means 
loss  all  round    Oh  for  more  devoutness  !    By  devoutness, 


TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 


I  do  not  mean  merely  the  emotion  and  excitement  of  a 
quick,  mobile,  but  maybe  shallow  spirit,  but  that  height 
and  depth  of  serene  and  intelligent  fellowship  which  is 
stirred  by  service,  and  deepened  by  knowledge,  and  elevated 
by  thought,  and  most  of  all  fed  by  prayer.  And  do  not  think 
lightly  of  knowledge  as  a  help  to  devoutness.  Our  Lord 
has  said  that  it  is  eternal  life  to  know  God.  Prayer  and 
knowing  react  on  each  other. 

The  other  treasure  of  which  I  spoke  was  character,  the 
result  of  fasting.  It  has  often  been  observed  that  our  Lord 
did  not  inculcate  fasting ;  for  an  age  which  practised  it  such 
admonition  was  unnecessary.  But  He  gave  them  regulations 
to  make  their  fasting  profitable.  While,  further,  He  did  not, 
like  John  the  Baptist,  enjoin  it  on  His  own  disciples  while 
He  was  with  them,  He  distinctly  intimated  that  when  He 
was  gone  they  would  fast.  The  proper  object  of  fasting  is 
the  discipline  of  character,  and  the  ultimate  value  of  it  is 
constant  self-control.  It  is,  of  course,  a  great  mistake  to 
suppose  that  abstinence  from  food  is  the  only  kind  of 
abstinence  that  the  Church  favours,  or  the  soul  requires. 
It  is  even  possible  that  abstinence  from  food  is  just  the 
one  kind  of  abstinence  which  we  are  not  to  practise,  because 
it  would  be  prejudicial  to  health,  and  therefore  to  usefulness. 
The  essence  of  the  matter  surely  is,  the  denying  or  limiting 
ourselves  for  a  certain  time  of  some  innocent  and  even 
laudable  enjoyment,  that  we  may  not  be  brought  under  the 
power  of  it,  however  innocent  and  laudable  it  may  be,  and 
that  we  may  become  the  absolute  masters  of  our  own  will 
so  as  to  learn  the  true  secret  of  manful  freedom. 

In  conclusion,  let  me  offer  you  some  few  practical  and 
simple  counsels,  to  help  you  in  each  of  these  matters  to  lay 
up  treasures  in  heaven. 


Il6  TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 

First,  if  you  would  lay  up  the  treasure  of  friendship,  try 
to  discover  (God  will  help  you)  wliat  service  you  can  best 
do,  or  what  person  you  can  best  help.  Let  it  be,  if  circum- 
stances so  permit,  an  additional  and  exceptional  service. 
A  sick  person  to  nurse,  an  afflicted  heart  to  comfort,  a 
little  child  to  teach,  a  lonely  friend  to  write  to  or  see. 
The  duty  will  be  made  plain  to  you,  if  you  wish  it  to  be 
made  plain ;  and  as  your  day,  so  your  strength  will  be. 
For  to  earn  love  you  must  give  love,  and  as  you  give  love, 
it  will  be  given  you  again — "good  measure,  pressed  down, 
and  shaken  together,  and  running  over."  Of  course  it 
may  happen  that  your  days  are  already  filled  with  ample 
and  suitable  duties,  and  that  to  add  more  would  simply 
mean  and  make  what  you  do  now  less  well  done  than 
before— which  would  be  loss,  not  gain.  In  such  a  case, 
try  to  do  what  you  are  doing  with  more  zeal,  and  exactness, 
and  joy,  and  self-devotion.  You  shall  have  your  reward 
in  the  love  of  God  constantly  shed  into  your  heart  by  the 
Holy  Ghost.  Be  well  assured  that  one  subject  studied, 
and  in  a  sense  mastered,  every  year — with  earnest  prayer 
preventing  and  following  it — will  enrich  your  spirit,  and 
deepen  your  capacity  for  the  vision  of  God. 

My  friends,  "who  can  tell  how  oft  he  offendeth?"  I 
cannot — you  cannot.  Let  us  search  our  hearts  and  turn 
to  the  Lord.  Who  of  us  is  not  guilty  from  time  to  time  of 
selfishness  and  indolence,  of  envy  and  jealousy,  of  levity 
and  self-indulgence,  of  pride  and  vanity,  of  hastiness  and 
resentment  ?  Let  us  be  on  our  watch  against  sins  of  the 
tongue  and  of  the  temper,  of  the  mind  and  of  the  flesh. 
The  soul  that  thirsts  for  God,  for  the  living  God,  shall  be 
satisfied.  The  soul  that  longs  to  be  delivered  from  the 
power  of  sin  shall  have  its  blessed  freedom.     The  soul 


TREASURES  IN  HEAVEN. 


117 


that  wishes  for  the  company  of  Jesus  Christ  shall  often 
hear  a  gentle,  a  wounded,  Hand  knocking  at  the  door — in  a 
word,  asking  to  be  let  in.  The  soul  that  longs  to  have  its 
treasures  in  heaven  need  not  fear  to  be  disappointed,  if 
only  it  will  seek  and  earn  them  here,  by  the  service  of  man 
and  the  fellowship  of  God. 


SYM  PATH  Y. 


"Those  who  bring  sunshine  to  the  hearts  of  others  cannot  keep  it 
from  themselves." 


SYMPATHY. 


Preached  in  Winchester  Cathedral,  Sexagesima  Sunday,  1892. 

"  Who  is  weak,  and  I  am  not  weak  ?  who  is  offended,  and  I  burn 
not  ?  " — 2  Cor.  xi.  29. 

An  attempt  has  lately  been  made  by  an  ingenious  and 
orthodox  divine  to  trace  from  his  writings  the  spiritual  de- 
velopment of  St.  Paul.  The  hypothesis  has  nothing  about  it 
to  startle  the  Christian  thinker ;  and  so  long  as  no  divergence 
can  be  established  inconsistent  with  his  inspired  authority,  or 
other  than  would  inevitably  arise  from  the  maturity  of  years, 
and  the  deepening  wisdom  of  accumulating  experience,  it  is 
only  w'hat  we  should  antecedently  expect  from  one  who,  like 
His  master,  presumably  grew  in  wisdom,  and  whose  mind, 
just  because  it  was  not  dead,  was  a  living  and  expanding 
organism.  The  chapter  from  which  the  text  is  taken  sets 
us  thinking  on  a  striking  phenomenon  in  the  personality  of 
the  apostle — I  mean  the  growth  of  and  mellowing  of  his 
character  through  the  discipline  of  life.  From  the  time 
that  we  first  come  upon  him,  with  them  of  Cilicia  and  Asia, 
disputing  with  Stephen,  and  then  going  out  with  a  fierce  joy 
to  watch  the  martyr  die,  to  the  day  when  he  was  led  out 
of  the  imperial  city — Paul  the  aged  " — himself  to  be  offered 
up  upon  the  service  and  sacrifice  of  his  faith,  a  vista  of 


122 


SYMPATHY. 


noble  years  seem  gradually  to  transfigure  him  into  an  ever 
more  tender  and  yet  still  majestic  beauty.  The  oftener  that 
he  is  called  to  bear  in  his  body  the  marks  of  the  Lord  Jesus, 
the  more  brightly  is  the  life  of  Jesus  manifested  in  his 
mortal  flesh. 

I  invite  you  seriously  to  meditate  on  a  subject  which 
ought  to  be  very  helpful  to  all  of  us,  both  in  its  historic 
and  exemplary  aspect — the  value  of  circumstances  in  the 
maturing  of  character.  A  man  does  what  he  is,  as  well 
as  is  what  he  does.  His  manners  make  him ;  but  what 
makes  his  manners?  It  is  possible,  of  course,  to  think  too 
much  of  circumstances — to  speak  of  ourselves,  in  the 
pessimistic  cant  of  the  hour,  as  the  helpless  victims  of 
destiny,  and  so  to  throw  back  our  moral  responsibility  on 
Almighty  God.  It  is  possible,  also,  to  think  too  little  of 
them,  and  to  refuse  to  discover,  greatly  to  the  loss  of  strength 
and  comfort,  the  sovereign  providence  of  a  Father.  The 
simple  truth  is,  that  what  we  call  circumstances  fall  more  or 
less  into  three  distinct  groups,  each  demanding  recognition, 
intelligence,  and  faith.  There  are  the  circumstances  in 
which  God  and  ourselves  concur  and  co-operate,  where  it  is 
impossible  to  distinguish  His  acting  from  ours.  There  are 
the  circumstances  for  which  we  are  ourselves  solely  respon- 
sible, and  which  conscience  in  its  voice  of  righteousness 
forbids  our  ascribing  to  any  other  volition  than  our  own. 
There  are  also  the  circumstances  of  our  birth,  our  environ- 
ment, our  physical  and  intellectual  gifts,  and  not  a  few 
critical  incidents  in  the  course  of  our  Hfe's  journey,  for 
which  the  only  reasonable  and  dutiful  way  of  accounting  is 
simply  to  say  about  them  that  they  happen  by  the  will 
of  God.  About  them  all,  however,  the  blessed  conviction  of 
this  same  apostle  comes  home  to  the  beHever's  heart  as 


SYMPATHY. 


123 


infallibly  true  :  "  We  know  that  all  things  work  together  for 
good  to  them  that  love  God,  to  them  who  are  the  called 
according  to  His  purpose." 

"  Who  is  weak,  and  I  am  not  weak  ?  who  is  offended,  and 
I  burn  not  ?  "  Now,  here,  as  perhaps  we  may  feel  the  apostle 
to  have  unconsciously  summarized  it,  in  the  sublime  and  yet 
inevitable  result  of  all  those  unparalleled  and  continuous  and 
magnificent  hardships,  with  which,  through  the  love  of  Christ 
constraining  him^  he  rejoiced  to  labour  for  the  salvation  of 
the  world,  we  have  a  glimpse  into  his  life,  which  makes  us 
instantly  see  how  little  St.  Luke's  narrative  has  enabled  us  to 
appreciate  of  his  work  and  sufferings.  We  are  also  helped 
to  understand  how  the  career  of  a  solitary  and  despised 
Hebrew  has  had  loftier  and  more  permanent  and  more 
complete  blessing  for  the  race  than  any  life  ever  lived — but 
one.  It  also  should  enable  us  to  learn — is  it  quite  presump- 
tuous to  say  so  ? — that  but  for  this  unrivalled  catalogue  of 
sacrifice  and  peril,  not  only  could  St.  Paul  not  have  done 
what  he  succeeded  in  doing,  but  he  could  not  have  been  the 
St.  Paul  to  do  it.  Some  things  we  know  about  him ;  some 
we  infer ;  some  we  guess.  Here,  however,  we  read,  as  by 
anticipation,  the  divine  answer  to  his  own  noble  prayer, 
when  we  ask  ourselves  the  question,  What  was  the  apostle 
before  these  mighty  sorrows  transformed  him  ? — "  That  I 
may  know  Him,  and  the  power  of  His  resurrection,  and  the 
fellowship  of  His  sufferings,  being  made  conformable  unto 
His  death."  We  seem  familiar  enough  with  the  salient 
features  of  his  natural  character.  We  can  appreciate  also, 
without  too  much  effort,  how  easy,  nay,  how  inevitable  it 
would  be,  that  these  great  qualities  would  be  liable,  but  for 
vigilance  and  self-discipline  and  close  fellowship  with  God,  to 
become  exaggerated,  and  to  lose  proportion  and  relation  to 


124 


SYMPATHY. 


other  also  indispensable  qualities,  and  through  such  exaggera- 
tion to  forfeit  influence  and  stir  dislike.  Further,  we  can  un- 
derstand, from  our  own  trifling  experience,  how  in  moments 
not  his  best,  nor  his  strongest,  he  would  be  sorely  tempted 
to  throw  up  his  grand  task  with  that  impetuousness  which 
makes  him  so  lovable,  and  without  which  he  could  never 
have  accompHshed  a  hundredth  part  of  this  work;  now 
keenly  disappointed,  now  insolently  silenced,  now  under- 
mined, now  passionately  assailed.  "  Without  were  fightings, 
within  were  fears."  Yet  also  we  are  to  see  the  good  hand  of 
his  God  making  his  way  plain,  and  his  enemies  ashamed  ; 
bringing  victory  out  of  defeat ;  and  whether  at  Philippi  or 
at  Rome,  making  the  things  which  happened  to  him  turn 
out  rather  for  the  furtherance  of  the  gospel.  Stripes  do  not 
silence  the  music  in  his  voice  ;  nor  can  Nero's  awful  house 
chill  the  divine  joy  in  his  spirit.  It  was  the  hymns  he  sang 
in  the  dungeon  that  brought  about  the  salvation  of  the 
Philippian  jailor.  "  Rejoice  in  the  Lord  alway,"  is  his 
message  from  the  Praetorium  which  still  stirs  the  heart  of 
the  world. 

More  than  one  stratum  of  circumstances  in  his  minis- 
terial career,  concurring  in  one  force  of  controlling  and 
sanctifying  discipline,  which,  when  added  to  his  manifest 
opportunities  and  Roman  citizenship,  his  rabbinical  and 
secular  training,  his  cultured  and  masculine  and  keen  dia- 
lectic, and  his  burning  zeal,  earned  him  his  spiritual  perfec- 
tion, won  for  him  his  final  triumph.  The  personal  animosity 
of  the  really  devout  Jews,  both  men  and  women,  in  such 
places  as  Perga,  must  have  been  an  incomprehensible  grief  to 
him.  Then,  as  his  immediate  reward  for  loyally  accepting 
the  counsel  of  the  Church  in  the  matter  of  purifying  himself 
in  the  temple,  he  nearly  lost  his  life,  quite  forfeited  his  free- 


SYMPATHY. 


125 


dom.  The  treacherous  and,  to  us,  almost  incomprehensible 
opposition  of  false  brethren  at  Rome,  who,  thinking  to  add 
affliction  to  his  bonds,  preached  Christ  of  envy  and  strife  ; 
the  interruption  during  four  years  of  his  public  ministry  at 
a  time  when  the  rapid  spread  of  the  gospel,  and  the  critical 
rivalry  between  the  two  great  parties  in  the  Church,  seemed  • 
to  make  his  presence  on  the  spot  essential  both  to  unity 
and  to  life ;  last,  but  not  least,  the  thorn  in  the  flesh — no 
doubt  a  bodily  infirmity,  not  fatal,  nor  indeed  vitally  destruc- 
tive of  usefulness,  but  giving  a  painful  uncertainty  to  the 
accomplishment  of  his  cherished  activities,  and  stirring 
among  those  who  did  not  personally  care  for  him  more 
vexation  than  pity ; — all  these  are  circumstances  in  his 
daily  and  changeful  lot  which  helped  to  heat  and  keep 
heated  that  crucible  of  divine  trial,  in  which  the  dross  was 
being  ever  purged  from  his  sinful  though  regenerate  nature ; 
which  must  have  helped  him  to  take  and  utter  as  the  con- 
stant language  of  his  soul,  "  My  times  are  in  thy  hands." 

But  in  this  chapter  we  come  across  other  trials  still,  and 
perhaps  of  a  subtler  and  more  penetrating  kind.  There  is, 
first,  the  bodily  humiliation  and  anguish,  whereby  the  iron 
entered  into  his  soul.  In  stripes  above  measure.  .  .  Of  the 
Jews  five  times  received  I  forty  stripes  save  one.  Thrice  " 
(probably  by  pagan  hands)  ''was  I  beaten  with  rods." 
Well,  some  of  us  may  have  learned  that  any  kind  of  pain  is 
power,  and  "  sorrow  is  the  deepest  thing  in  the  world  ; "  but 
when  shame  and  degradation  go  with  it  for  Christ's  sake,  it  is 
multiplied  tenfold.  Of  perils  of  waters  he  writes,  "  Thrice 
I  suffered  shipwreck,"  and  this  before  the  tempest  in  the 
sea  of  Adria  ;  yet  more  terrible  still — "  a  night  and  a  day  I 
have  been  in  the  deep,"  watching  the  sun  go  down,  to  leave 
him  hopeless  in  the  darkness  and  storm;  waiting  for  the 


126 


SYMPATHY. 


tedious  hours  to  go,  and  the  sun  to  rise,  and  to  see  no  ship 
on  the  horizon.  How  this  must  have  helped  him  to  feel  the 
sustaining  presence  of  the  living  God  as  nothing  else  could, 
and  to  say  as  one  had  said  before,  with  awful  meaning  in 
the  words,  "  Though  He  slay  me,  yet  will  I  trust  in  Him  "  ! 

Of  "  deaths  oft,"  he  writes,  as  also  in  the  First  Epistle  to 
these  same  Corinthians,  I  die  daily."  I  suppose  there  is 
nothing  that  so  awes  and  stills  and  hallows  the  human 
spirit  as  to  go  down  into  the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death, 
to  the  far  end  of  it,  and  to  feel  the  golden  gates  all  but 
opening,  and  the  light  and  the  music  come  through,  and 
then  all  close  again,  for  the  time  is  not  yet  come.  Out  of 
the  dark  valley  we  go,  back  into  life,  but  with  a  deep  awe  on 
our  spirits,  with  the  feeling  of  having  seen  God,  such  as 
does  not  leave  us  for  years.  This  was  the  apostle's  experi- 
ence, not  once  or  twice,  but,  as  he  tells  us,  often  ;  and  what 
a  sense  it  must  have  given  him  of  the  uncertainty  of  life, 
and  the  vanity  of  human  success,  and  the  nobleness  of 
duty,  and  the  nearness  and  loveliness  of  God.  Of  weariness 
and  painfulness,  of  cold  and  nakedness,  he  writes,  as  of 
common  daily  things.  They  must  have  made  the  spiritual 
world  very  real  to  him,  and  the  hope  of  glory  the  constant 
gladness  of  his  soul.  Elsewhere  he  writes  of  having  *'no 
certain  dwelling-place;"  here  of  journeyings  often,"  of 
cold  and  nakedness."  To  a  young  strong  man  these  are 
trifles ;  his  pride  of  manhood  almost  makes  him  glory  in 
them.  As  years  multiply  and  strength  decays,  they  are 
heavy  and  not  ignoble  burdens. 

There  is  one  thing  more— the  noblest,  the  hardest,  the 
blessedest  of  all ;  that  which  never  left  him,  sleeping  or 
waking,  lying  down  or  rising  up  ;  with  friends,  or  in  solitude  ; 
in  prayer  to  God,  or  in  communion  with  his  own  spirit — 


SYMPATHY. 


127 


"  That  which  cometh  upon  me  daily,  the  care  of  all  the 
Churches."  These  he  had  to  correct,  these  to  admonish ; 
now  to  console,  now  to  rebuke.  All  sent  to  him,  for  all 
needed  him,  and  it  would  have  pained  him  more  if  they  had 
not  come  for  what  they  wanted.  Yet  sometimes  with  anguish 
of  soul  and  many  tears  he  sent  them  his  answer ;  sometimes, 
too,  let  us  confess,  with  words  that  smote  and  scorn  that 
burned.  The  end  and  result  of  it  all — to  borrow  the  words 
of  the  text — was  a  sublime  and  indescribable  sympathy. 
"Who  is  weak,  and  I  am  not  weak?  who  is  offended,  and 
I  burn  not  ?  " 

Sympathy  has  two  sides  to  it — that  of  pity,  and  that  of 
indignation ;  that  which  yearns  with  compassion,  and  that 
which  is  wroth  with  sin.  Just  as  with  the  Lord,  we  read 
that  He  had  compassion  on  the  multitude,  because  they  had 
been  a  long  time  with  Him,  and  had  nothing  to  eat,  and  had 
come  from  far ;  also,  that  He  rebuked  a  ruler  of  the  syna- 
gogue with  anger,  because  he  discouraged  a  woman  from 
coming  to  be  healed  on  the  sabbath  day.  The  great 
apostle  as  much  wins  our  affection  by  his  tears  as  our 
respect  by  his  sternness.  His  sympathy,  remember,  was 
not  the  transient  spasm  of  a  sudden  emotion,  nor  the  cheap 
utterance  of  easy  and  turgid  phrases,  which  boasted  much 
and  held  nothing ;  like  the  gleam  of  a  winter's  sun,  soon 
passing  again  behind  the  clouds,  and  only  leaving  disappoint- 
ment behind.  It  was  the  continual,  inevitable,  unconscious 
going  out  of  active  love  from  a  heart  that  overflowed  with  it, 
to  all  who  needed  it,  to  all  who  came  in  his  way.  It  helped 
him  to  be  all  things  to  all  men,  through  the  power  of  a  vivid 
imagination,  which  enabled  him  to  put  himself  in  his 
neighbour's  place,  and  of  a  moral  sensibility,  which  ever 
stirred  him  to  hate  that  which  was  evil,  and  to  cleave  to  that 


128 


SYMPATHY. 


which  was  good — whereby  by  all  means  he  saved  many; 
I  say,  further,  it  was  the  discipline  of  his  life  that  was  the 
secret  of  it,  that  gave  him  the  will  and  the  power  to  save. 

To  conclude  :  first  let  us  observe  that  notwithstanding 
his  weak  health,  and  his  long  imprisonments,  and  his  mani- 
fold disappointments,  and  his  bitter  opposition,  the  apostle 
found  time  to  complete  a  work  which  has  withstood  the 
storms  and  outUved  the  empires  of  eighteen  centuries ;  and 
that  weak  as  often  he  felt  to  be,  beaten  as  often  he  seemed 
to  be,  he  was  always  strong  enough  for  the  duty  God  called 
him  to  accomplish,  and  his  life  was  not  taken  till  his  work 
was  done. 

My  friends,  you  especially  to  whom  working  for  God  is 
at  once  the  honour  and  delight  of  your  lives,  never  fear 
that  you  will  not  have  time  enough  for  all  the  good  works 
God  has  ordained  for  you  to  walk  in  ;  this  rather  fear,  that 
your  will  may  be  slack,  and  your  sacrifices  few.  God  is 
wise,  and  He  knows  how  to  accomplish  His  own  purposes. 
God  is  strong,  and  He  will  command  strength  for  you. 
God  is  just,  and  not  with  Pharaoh's  justice.  God  is  love, 
and  He  does  not  grudge  us  the  joy  of  thankful  duty.  We 
are  immortal  till  our  work  is  done.  When  it  is  done,  we 
can  be  spared  for  Paradise. 

See  the  gift  to  claim  :  the  gift  which  binds  all  per- 
fection, transfigures  all  activities,  satisfies  all  necessities, 
ennobles  all  experiments ;  the  gift  which  is  at  once  the 
nature  of  God,  and  His  method — the  gift  of  Christian 
sympathy.  In  some  it  is  born  full-orbed,  and  so  easier ; 
with  others,  the  germ  is  in  them,  but  it  needs  cultivating. 
All  need  the  stirring  and  deepening  and  educating  of  it  by 
the  discipline  of  sorrow.  Welcome  sorrow,  that  you  may 
understand  more  perfectly,  and  touch  more  skilfully,  and 


SYMPATHY. 


129 


speak  more  tenderly ;  ay,  in  your  very  silence,  making  it  felt 
how  your  heart  loves  if  your  lips  are  dumb.  Oh,  to  have 
more  of  this  gift  of  love  ! — for  it  turns  earth  into  heaven, 
and  makes  man  the  very  sacrament  of  God.  Ask  for  it,  and 
remember  that  it  can  come  in  only  one  way,  and  let  it  come 
in  that  way ;  and  when  it  comes,  keep  it,  and  deserve  to 
have  more. 

Once  more — get  the  joy  to  learn  that  all  things  are 
yours,  and  that  you  are  Christ's,  and  that  Christ  is  God's ; 
and  so  that  you  are  not  more  His  precious  possession  than 
that  God  Himself  is  yours.  I  think  that  the  end  and  reward 
of  all  sorts  of  sorrow  is  to  learn  how  to  fall  back  upon  God, 
and  rest  in  Him  as  our  one  Portion  and  Joy.  That  God  in 
Christ  must  have  been  to  St.  Paul.  The  hfe  we  have  been 
contemplating  would  have  been  an  intolerable  misery  without 
it.  With  God,  every  tear  he  shed,  every  pang  he  knew,  was 
but  a  new  opportunity  for  the  divine  sweetness.  Some 
day,  when  God  summons  us,  we  too  shall  see  Him  face  to 
face.  Then  we  shall  understand,  as  we  cannot  understand 
now,  that  "  our  light  affliction,  which  is  but  for  a  moment, 
worketh  for  us  a  far  more  exceeding  and  eternal  weight 
of  glory,"  and  that  the  secret  of  the  apostle  means  the 
fellowship  of  Christ. 


THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 


"  There  is  but  one  possible  final  proof  of  Christianity,  and  that  is  its 
own  essential  truth." 


THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 


Preached  in  Rochester  Cathedral^  December  4,  1883. 

"Where  is  the  promise  of  His  coming?  " — 2  Pet.  iii.  4. 

This  was  a  scoff,  St.  Peter  says.  None  the  less  important 
for  that;  none  the  less  demanding  an  answer.  It  ought 
not,  indeed,  to  be  hard  to  prove  the  shallowness  of  it,  if 
only  from  the  superficial  nature  of  the  reason  on  which 
it  stands.  Why  was  this  coming — the  supreme,  triumphal, 
spousal  coming  of  the  Son  of  man — scoffed  at  in  this 
insolent  fashion,  and  His  followers  taunted  with  folly  in 
expecting  an  event  which  it  was  just  as  reasonable  to  ask 
and  hope  for  as  for  a  child  to  cry  for  the  moon  ?  On  the 
ground,  I  suppose — in  our  own  day,  so  calmly,  so  blandly, 
and  with  a  sense  of  such  superior  wisdom  urged  against  the 
supernatural,  and  all  related  to  it — that  "  miracles  do  not 
happen."  "  All  things  continue  as  they  were  from  the 
beginning  of  the  creation."  In  other  words,  the  physical 
order  is  the  only  order  of  which  the  human  mind  can  be 
asked  to  take  cognizance.  The  invisible  region  of  the 
universe,  where  lie  concealed,  none  the  less  potent  or 
real  for  that,  the  mighty  springs  of  will  and  mind,  and 
government  and  providence,  is  to  be  treated  as  if  it  did  not 


134 


THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 


exist,  because  no  method  is  open  to  us  for  questioning  or 
analyzing  it.  As  we  do  not  see  it,  and  may  not  examine  it, 
therefore,  for  all  practical  purposes,  it  cannot  be  said  to  be. 
How  this  sorry  view  of  things  limits  the  area  of  observation, 
dwarfs  and  ignores  some  of  the  loftiest  capacities  of  man, 
degrades  us  by  limiting  the  knowable  to  the  senses,  robs 
the  spirit  of  its  grandest  inspirations  and  noblest  ideals; 
how,  if  even  universally  accepted  and  acted  on,  it  would 
inevitably  send  us  back  to  something  far  worse  than  the 
despair  and  the  paganism  of  the  Caesars,  may  the  Church 
never  suffer  the  world  to  discover,  nor  herself  be  base 
enough  to  permit. 

The  text  contains  two  ideas— 

I.  The  coming. 

II.  The  delay. 

My  friends,  let  us,  too,  ask  this  question  at  a  time  when 
it  is  so  suitable,  so  dutiful,  so  helpful,  to  ask  it.  So  suitable; 
for  the  one  thought  that  solemnizes  this  blessed  season  is 
the  Second  Advent.  So  dutiful ;  for  it  honours  our  Lord 
to  put  questions  to  Him  about  it,  so  long  as  they  come 
from  eager  and  reverent  love.  Helpful ;  for  ought  it  not  to 
stir  unity,  diligence,  prayer  ?  Humbling,  also  ;  for  how  many 
of  us  really  desire  that  coming,  as  the  goal  of  our  felicity, 
and  the  crowning  of  our  real  happiness  ?  Were  the  King 
of  saints  to  come  back  this  night — allowance  duly  made 
for  the  awe  every  soul  must  feel  at  the  first  sight  of  God 
— could  we  sincerely  say,  as  the  prophet  tells  us  some 
will  say,  *'This  is  our  God;  we  have  waited  for  Him,  and 
He  will  save  us  :  this  is  our  God ;  we  have  waited  for 
Him,  we  will  be  glad  and  rejoice  in  His  salvation" ? 

1.  The  COMING.  Both  the  Testaments  say  much  of 
Christ's  coming  ;  and  if,  in  the  literal,  historical  sense  of 


THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 


the  words,  there  are  but  two  real  visible  comings  spoken 
of,  each  complethig  an  epoch  in  the  Church's  history — the 
first  at  the  Incarnation,  the  second  at  the  Final  Judgment — 
in  an  inferior  and  mystical,  but  still  actual  sense,  this 
promise  of  the   coming  has  continually  and  solemnly 
fulfilled  itself,  at  sundry  times  and  in  divers  manners, 
whether  in  woeful  judgments,  or  in  marked  eras  of  light 
and  beatitude,  to  nations  and  to  Churches,  to  congregations 
and  to  individual  souls.    He  came  to  Israel,  when  Titus 
drove  his  ploughshare  of  indescribable  anguish  through 
the  hearts  of  the  miserable  Jews;  and  to  France,  when 
the  Revolution,  that  began  just  a  century  ago,  and  is  still 
a  living  volcano,  woke  her  up  out  of  a  hideous  trance,  and 
made  the  nations  say,  "Here  is  the  God  of  Judgment;" 
and  to  Euroj)e,  wlien  the   Reformation,  for  which  we 
may  surely  still  give  humble  thanks  to  God,  gave  the 
soul  freedoai  and  the  conscience  truth;  and  to  England, 
when  Augustine  landed  in  Kent  with  a  second  message 
of  the  everlasting  gospel;  or  when,  a  century  ago,  the 
doctrines  of  grace,  with  all  their  subsequent  developments, 
and  not  yet  concluded  revivals,  whether  of  life,  or  worship, 
or  duty,  brought  a  blessed  resurrection  to  the  Church.    It  is 
He  who  visits  the  soul,  when  it  is  converted  to  repentance 
and  devotion ;  it  is  He  who  comes  to  a  congregation  or  a 
parish,  when  a  pastor  comes  or  goes,  or  a  wave  of  spiritual 
life  baptizes  a  crowd  of  souls  for  the  Word  of  God  to  have 
free  course  and  be  glorified.    He  who  walketh  among  the 
seven  golden  candlesticks,  trims  them  with  oil,  and  makes 
them  burn  more  brig-litly.    But  it  is  His  coming  to  them 
that  does  it.    Every  gift  of  His  grace  is  His  presence 
brought  close  to  the  soul. 

Yet  these  are  but  premonitions  and  foreshadowings  of 


136  THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 

that  final  and  royal  Advent,  when  He  shall  come  for  the 
revelation  of  His  glory,  the  vindication  of  His  government, 
the  judgment  of  humanity,  and  the  crowning  of  His  saints. 
It  will  be  public  and  supernatural,  and  be  the  end. 

He  will  reveal  His  glory,  for  all  His  saints  will  be  with 
Him;  and  they  will  be  His  glory — those  who  loved  not  their 
lives  unto  the  death,  whom  His  example  and  cross,  and 
love  and  presence,  drew  to  Him  with  an  irresistible  power ; 
the  satisfaction  of  His  soul's  travail,  the  spoils  from  the 
house  of  the  strong  man  armed,  and  the  joy  unspeakable 
of  the  angels  in  light.  He  shall  come,  as  St.  Paul  says, 
"to  be  glorified  in  His  saints,  and  admired  in  all  them 
that  believe." 

He  will  come  to  vindicate  His  government,  as  to  its 
righteousness,  wisdom,  and  mercy.  Many  hard  things  are 
said  against  Him  now.  He  is  silent,  and  waits,  knowing 
that  one  day  He  will  justify  Himself.  Who  of  us  that 
observes  and  thinks  but  has,  must  have,  difficulties  which 
he  cannot  answer,  listens  to  cavils  to  which  silence  is  the 
best  reply  ?  To  such  He  says,  "  In  your  patience  possess 
ye  your  souls."  These  things  perplex,  try,  even  sadden 
us ;  and  sometimes  sadness  and  distress  are  the  inevitable 
accompaniments  of  loyalty  and  saintliness.  There  is  a 
morning  at  hand,  which  shall  be  without  clouds.  When 
Christ  comes  back,  these  shadows  shall  flee  away. 

He  will  come  to  judge  the  world ;  and  in  one  respect 
that  judgment  will  need  neither  witnesses  nor  sentence. 
Each  man's  own  soul  will  be  witness  and  judge  against 
itself  Memory,  relentless  and  awakened  memory,  will 
bring  up  out  of  its  hoards  our  past — all  our  past ;  and  if 
the  blood  of  Christ  has  not  washed  our  robes  and  made 
them  white  as  with  a  fuller's  whiteness,  the  vision  of  the 


THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 


spotless  Christ  will  entirely  and  tremendously  reveal  the 
guilt  and  hideousness  of  sin.  Yes,  of  all  kinds  of  loneliness, 
the  bitterest  is,  that  there  a  man's  own  faculty  of  self-defence 
deserts  him.  Of  all  sorts  of  reproof,  none  is  so  stinging, 
so  abiding,  as  the  voice  of  conscience  in  the  soul. 

He  will  also  come  to  crown  His  saints.  Come,  ye 
blessed  of  My  Father."  It  is  hard  to  get  to  the  bottom 
of  the  blessedness  of  those  words.  Certainly  we  shall 
hear  them  pronounced  to  others.  May  we  hope  to 
listen  to  them  for  ourselves !  Christ's  reward  to  us  will, 
I  suppose,  be  threefold  ;  it  will  be  sanctity,  dignity,  and 
service.  Sanctity :  We  shall  be  like  Him,  for  we  shall 
see  Him  as  He  is."  But  some  will  be  more  like  Him  than 
others,  having  loved  him  more.  Dignity  :  To  him  that 
overcometh  will  I  give  to  sit  with  Me  on  My  throne."  Our 
dignity  will  be  in  our  nearness  to  Him.  Some  will  be 
nearer  than  others  then,  for  they  have  walked  more  closely 
with  Him  here.  Service  :  "  His  servants  shall  serve  Him." 
He  will  choose  the  service,  and  we  shall  render  it.  And 
with  what  untold  joy  !  Even  now  in  our  best  moments — 
and  we  are  not  always  at  our  best — when  heaven  most 
enters  into  our  souls,  we  know  something  of  the  blessedness 
and  of  the  honour  of  doing  something  for  Him  here, 
however  little.  There,  when  sickness  will  not  weaken  us, 
nor  old  age  unnerve  us,  when  selfishness  will  not  decline 
His  offers,  nor  self-love  demur  to  them,  it  will  indeed  be 
our  meat  and  drink  to  do  our  Father's  will,  and  there  will 
be  neither  failure,  weariness,  nor  decay. 

II.  But  there  is  the  delay.  "  Where  is  the  promise  of 
His  coming?"  And  the  fact  of  this  delay  is  not  only 
admitted,  but  almost  emphasized  by  the  apostle's  explana- 
tion afterwards  :  "  The  Lord  is  not  slack  concerning  His 


138 


THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 


promise,  as  some  men  count  slackness ;  but  is  long-suffering 
to  us-ward,  not  willing  that  any  should  perish,  but  that 
all  should  come  to  repentance.  .  .  .  Wherefore  account  that 
the  long-suffering  of  our  Lord  is  salvation."  You  ask  why 
does  the  Lord  delay?  ''Long-suffering,"  is  the  answer;  the 
patience  of  the  Redeemer's  hope.  Speaking  with  trembling 
lips,  and  with  a  sense  of  unworthiness  and  incapacity  to 
comprehend  the  purpose  of  His  all-wise  and  all-merciful 
will,  we  may  gather  from  Holy  Scripture  these  two  reasons. 

First  in  our  Lord's  own  words:  "This  gospel  of  the 
kingdom  shall  be  preached  in  all  the  world  for  a  witness  unto 
all  nations,  and  then  shall  the  end  come."  But  it  takes  time 
to  preach  it;  and  even  now  we  are  losing  time.  How  much 
more  did  the  Church  lose  it,  and  fail  to  see  her  duty  about 
it,  from  the  day  that  the  Moslem  invasion  devastated  the 
East  and  South,  until  the  quite  recent  time  when  the  idea  of 
missions  dawned  like  a  revelation  on  mankind  !  At  this 
moment  there  must  be  millions  and  millions  of  souls  on  which 
not  the  feeblest  ray  from  the  face  or  the  cross  of  Chribt 
has  for  one  moment  lingered ;  and  let  the  Church  speed 
on  her  way  with  flight  as  eager  and  heart  as  joyous  as 
an  angel's  from  heaven  with  a  message  to  some  penitent 
soul,  it  is  still  a  gigantic  task,  and  a  long  one,  even  to 
preach  Christ  once  to  all.  Not  by  any  means  that  the 
mere  presence  of  Christianity  in  the  world  has  not  proved 
a  living  force  for  its  improvement  and  happiness  in  a 
thousand  ways.  It  has  been  well  said  that  "  Christianity 
is  the  great  reforming  power  of  the  world;"  and  any  one 
who  needs  to  be  convinced  by  it  should  read  a  book 
recently  published,  called  "  Brace's  Gesta  Christi,"  which 
by  a  series  of  solid  facts  lucidly  arranged,  and  forcibly 
pressed,  and  intelligently  explained,  proves  by  an  accumu- 


THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 


lating  argument  how  jurisprudence  and  war,  the  laws  of 
nations  and  the  dignity  of  women,  marriage  and  slavery, 
hospitality  and  human  society  at  large,  have  felt  the  breath 
of  Jesus  of  Nazareth  as  He  passed  by — got  healing,  though 
they  knew  not  from  whom.  The  principles,  ideals,  and 
precepts  of  Christianity  are  still  the  light  and  medicine 
of  the  world. 

But  there  is  yet  another  reason  why  the  Lord  delays 
His  coming;  where  we  touch  the  border  of  deep  and 
even  dark  mysteries ;  where  wise  and  humble  lips  will 
not  presume  to  dogmatize,  but  where  the  heart  of  faith, 
groping  for  the  light,  thinks,  hopes,  and  adores.  Those 
w^ho  have  a  tender  compassion  for  souls,  and  who, 
looking  out  upon  the  heathen  world  abroad,  and  on 
our  heathenized  masses  at  home,  think  with  heart  as 
well  as  reason  what  difference  the  '"'slant  of  the  sun"' 
in  spiritual  as  well  as  temporal  things  must  make  in 
the  chances  of  a  soul  for  its  life  and  goodness;  those, 
too,  who  observe  the  gulf  that  separates  even  professing 
Christians  in  their  moral  and  spiritual  condition  as  they 
pass  out  to  God ;  above  all,  those  who  rest  upon  the  divine 
righteousness,  as  upon  the  rock  of  adamant,  and  who  again 
and  again  say  to  themselves,  as  doubts,  and  chills,  and  fears, 
and  perplexities  disturb  and  harass  them,  "  Shall  not 
the  Judge  of  all  the  earth  do  right  ?  " — and  are  not  some 
of  you  among  them  ? — these  seem  to  see  in  this  delay  of 
the  Second  Advent  the  blessed  mystery  of  the  redeeming 
purpose,  not  indeed  fully  revealed  to  us,  lest  sinners  should 
presume  on  it — which  nevertheless  is,  and  fulfils  itself 
according  to  the  pleasure  of  Him  who  willeth  not  that 
any  should  perish,  but  that  all  should  be  saved,  while 
some  make  light  of  the  Saviour's  own  words  of  the  worm 


140  THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 

that  dieth  not,  and  of  the  fire  that  never  shall  be 
quenched. 

The  fact,  already  hinted,  is  that  millions  of  human 
souls,  brought  into  this  world  by  God's  providence,  without 
any  choice  of  their  own,  have  passed  through  and  out  of 
it  without  a  single  opportunity  of  savingly  knowing  Him 
as  their  reconciled  Father  in  Christ.  The  principle  is 
that  He  will  never  condemn  one  of  His  own  creatures  for 
losing  a  salvation  which  was  never  offered  to  him ;  and  that 
in  some  way  or  other,  and  at  some  time  or  other,  we  may 
humbly  expect  Him,  from  the  hints  that  Holy  Scripture 
scatters  on  the  subject,  if  not  what  we  must  independently 
and  assuredly  expect  of  His  righteousness  and  love,  to 
enable  them,  as  He  has  enabled  us,  to  see  Him  and  live. 

Thus  reverent  thinkers  are  coming  increasingly  to  feel 
it  to  be  likely  that  the  key  to  the  problems  of  what  is 
called  eschatology  is  to  be  found  in  our  blessed  Lord's 
personal  administration  of  the  intermediate  state ;  and  that 
He  who  has  since  His  resurrection  distinctly  described 
Himself  as  having  "the  keys  of  hell  and  of  death," 
Who  before  His  resurrection  went  and  preached  to  the 
spirits  in  prison,  may,  in  that  waiting-time  for  His  return, 
which  certainly  is  not  a  period  of  utter  unconsciousness, 
be  a  centre  of  light  and  salvation  and  goodness  to  human 
souls,  who  here  have  had  no  real  chance  of  accepting 
Him,  in  a  way  and  by  methods  of  which  we  can  form 
no  conception.  But  if  this  be  so,  it  is  at  least  another 
justification  of  His  delayed  return.  "Jesus  Himself  was 
not  afraid  for  God,"  though  no  one  loved  mankind  as  He 
did,  no  one  knew  God  as  He  did,  no  one  is  so  likely  to  be 
jealous  for  His  Father's  honour.  If  we,  with  all  reverence 
and  humility,  still  cannot  help  sometimes  putting  to  our- 


THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 


141 


selves  that  noble  question,  "What  is  worthy  of  God?"  while 
conscious  of  our  inadequacy  fully  to  answer  it — conscious, 
also,  that  not  our  own  spiritual  instincts  alone  are  sufficient 
to  answer  it,  but  that  in  Holy  Scripture  we  must  also 
seek  a  lamp  for  our  feet,  and  a  light  for  our  path, — then 
we  shall  see  in  the  divine  delay  but  another  instance  of 
that  patience  of  God  which  Christ's  own  parable  illustrates, 
in  the  shepherd  seeking  the  lost  sheep  "  until  he  find 
it;"  also  we  shall  see  how  there  is  but  "one  limit  to  the 
redeeming  power  of  God's  love  in  Christ — the  limit  of  a 
human  will  which  persistently  rejects  the  divine." 

"Where  is  the  promise  of  His  coming  ?"  To  conclude 
— this  Advent,  this  coming  of  Christ,  is  at  once  a  test,  and 
a  crisis,  and  a  motive,  and  a  joy. 

As  I  have  already  hinted,  it  is  a  test ;  and,  O  Christian 
people,  were  He  to  come  to-night,  how  should  you  and 
I  meet  Him  ?  Is  His  coming  a  promise  for  you  ?  Of  course 
our  going  to  Him  in  death,  any  more  than  His  coming 
to  us  in  judgment,  cannot  have  power  to  alter  our  spiritual 
condition,  or  to  effect  a  change  which  has  not  been 
effected  before.  "Behold,  He  cometh  with  clouds;  and 
every  eye  shall  see  Him,  and  they  also  which  pierced 
Him :  and  all  kindreds  of  the  earth  shall  wail  because  of 
Him.'- 

No  one  can  go  forth  to  meet  Him  whose  lamp  is  not 
trimmed  and  his  light  burning.  Only  those  in  conscious 
union  with  Him,  and  who  know  Him  to  be  the  Lord  of 
their  hearts,  can  even  think  of  that  return  without  infinite 
trouble  and  distress.  Only  those  who  are  trying  to  serve 
Him,  praying  to  resemble  Him,  and  content  to  suffer  for 
Him,  can  claim  Him  when  He  comes  back  as  their  ^Master 
and  Lord. 


142  THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 

"Where  is  the  promise  of  His  coming?"  Is  it  a  promise 
for  you?  It  will  be  a  crisis.  Whatever  it  may  be  the 
purpose  of  God's  redeeming  love  to  do  between  death 
and  judgment  for  those  who  have  had  no  opportunities 
for  salvation  and  goodness,  Scripture  gives  no  faintest 
hope  for  supposing  that  such  a  condition  of  mercy  can 
be  prolonged  after  judgment.  The  great  revelation  will 
then  have  been  made,  and  with  its  final  issues.  The 
revelation  of  Christ  to  man  will  have  resulted  in  the 
revelation  of  man  to  himself ;  and  what  can  there  be  to 
follow?  ''He  that  is  unjust,  let  him  be  unjust  still:  and 
he  which  is  filthy,  let  him  be  filthy  still :  and  he  that  is 
righteous,  let  him  be  righteous  still :  and  he  that  is  holy, 
let  him  be  holy  still."  The  choice  will  have  been  made 
already  ''between  a  life  growing  rich  unto  God,  or  starving 
upon  self — its  real  final  choice  between  the  true,  the  eternal 
life,  and  the  eternal  death  of  the  heart."  That  choice 
you  at  least,  beloved  brethren,  are  making  now,  possibly 
have  already  made;  and  the  acts  of  each  hour  are  more 
surely  and  finally  committing  you  to  it.  What  I  want  you 
to  see  is  that  the  Second  Advent  will  reveal  and  confirm 
it,  and  that  for  those  who  have  chosen  against  Christ — 
or,  what  comes  to  the  same  thing,  have  steadfastly  refused 
to  choose  Him,  and  have  drifted  down  the  tides  of  the 
world,  and  have  consciously  and  resolutely  and  finally 
turned  from  Him — grace  will  be  over,  in  mercy  as  well 
as  in  judgment,  when  Jesus  Christ  comes  back. 

"Where  is  the  promise  of  His  coming?"  Is  the 
coming  a  promise  to  you  ?  The  advent  is  also  a  motive. 
For  steadfastness  of  purpose,  for  diligence  in  duty,  for 
meekness  of  temper,  for  sweetness  of  charity,  for  man- 
fulness   of  self-control,  for  completeness  of  self-culture, 


THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 


for  exactness  of  knowledge,  for  mellowness  of  thought. 
Memory  disciplined,  habits  cultivated,  reason  exercised, 
taste  matured ;  the  thinker's  steadfastness,  the  speaker's 
carefulness,  the  student's  love  of  knowledge,  and  the 
writer's  use  of  it; — all  these,  be  sure,  are  steadily  and 
inevitably  accumulating  their  final  and  magnificent  reward, 
when  Christ  comes  back  to  give  to  each  man  according  as 
his  works  shall  be.  Yes,  not  only  for  our  moral  goodness 
and  our  spiritual  capacity  shall  we  each  have  our  place 
of  glory  and  our  raiment  of  light,  but  for  the  full  use  of 
all  our  powers,  and  the  diligent  improvement  of  all  our 
capacities,  and  the  beneficent  employment  of  all  our 
resources,  and  the  ready  energy  of  all  our  opportunities, 
and  the  steady  maturing  of  all  our  gifts,  shall  our  judg- 
ment and  our  crown  be  given.  Nothing  lost,  nothing 
forgotten,  nothing  despised,  of  effort,  and  diligence,  and 
thought,  and  perseverance.  All  shall  come  up  to  be 
recognized ;  and  the  righteousness  of  love  shall  apportion 
our  felicity. 

Now,  do  not  you  see  how  this  should  give  a  dignity, 
a  grandeur,  a  kind  of  awful  significance,  to  the  meanest 
life,  if  but  a  Christian  life,  and  lived  in  all  good  conscience 
before  God,  such  as  no  human  words  can  say?  So  I 
ask  again,  "Where  is  the  promise  of  His  coming?"  Is 
that  coming  a  promise  to  you  ? 

Once  more,  it  will  be  joy — to  those  to  whom  Jesus  Christ 
now  is  the  best  possession  of  their  hearts.  Joy  for  what 
it  will  reveal,  remove,  and  bestow. 

It  will  reveal  Christ.  I  dare  not,  I  cannot,  I  must 
not,  say  what  it  will  be  when  we  first  gaze  on  Him.  It  is 
too  sacred  to  chatter  about  with  these  soiled  lips;  all 
we  can  say  is,  it  will  not  disappoint  us ;  "  we  shall  be 


144  THE  PROMISE  OF  HIS  COMING. 

satisfied,  when  we  awake,  with  His  likeness ; "  we  shall 
each  see  Him  at  once,  and  it  will  be  as  if  only  we  saw 
Him,  and  He  saw  only  us,  and  seeing  Him  will  be  our 
transfiguration. 

It  will  remove  all  stain  and  germ  of  sin;  all  thought 
and  sadness  of  separation ;  all  fear  of  infirmity ;  all  cloud 
and  mist  of  confusion  and  despair. 

It  will  bestow ;  and  we  should  ever  remember  that,  in 
the  world  to  come,  space  and  time  will  be  things  of  the 
past.  It  will  bestow  youth  that  will  never  fade,  knowledge 
that  will  ever  widen,  duties  which  will  at  once  continue  life 
and  expand  it;  sanctity  which  will  more  and  more  com- 
prehend the  perfection  of  God.  Earthly  and  temporal 
limitations  will  be  over ;  our  society  shall  become  an  ever- 
present  companionship  of  the  redeemed;  and  friendship 
will  not  be  a  melancholy  dream,  but  a  solid  delight.  As 
we  look  into  each  other's  faces  in  that  "  blessed  country," 
the  thought  of  an  inevitable  parting  will  not  shoot  sudden 
sadness  through  our  souls.  "  For  ever  with  the  Lord." 
Then  we  shall  see  that  God  in  Christ  makes  heaven. 

Once  again,  "Where  is  the  promise  of  His  coming?" 
Is  His  coming  a  promise  for  you  ? 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH. 


L-15 


"  It  is  beautiful  to  see  how  death  gives  liberty  to  life." 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH. 


Preached  in  the  Cathedral,  Victoria^  Vancouver  Island, 
September  \,  1887. 

"Verily,  verily,  I  say  unto  you,  If  a  man  keep  My  saying,  he  shall 
never  see  death." — John  viii.  51. 

The  Pharisees  were  startled  at  this  saying,  and  we  cannot 
wonder  at  it.  It  so  flatly  contradicted  the  universal  ex- 
perience of  mankind,  that  every  one  challenged  it.  It 
asserted  so  pointedly  the  personal  claims  of  Christ,  that 
there  seemed  to  be  but  one  of  two  alternatives  :  either  He 
had  a  devil,  and  so  was  not  accountable  for  His  sayings ; 
or  He  was  a  blasphemer,  and  then  He  deserved  to  be  stoned. 
Christ,  we  may  observe,  expected,  and  indeed  intended  this. 

Nay,  it  was  His  method,  and  He  had  often  used  it  before. 
A  sincere  teacher,  whatever  his  doctrine  may  be,  aims  at 
two  results  with  his  hearers.  He  must  make  them  think, 
that  justice  may  be  done  to  His  teaching.  He  must  make 
them  feel,  that  their  convictions  may  pass  into  their  lives. 
Now,  wherever  there  is  stubborn  prejudice,  and  that  in- 
veterate repugnance  to  spiritual  teaching  which  a  hard 
formalism  invariably  engenders  in  the  mind,  a  gentle  and 
winning  persuasiveness  will  only  stir  contempt.  The  crust 
of  obstinate  traditionalism  needs  to  be  suddenly,  even 


148 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH. 


roughly,  penetrated  with  the  spear's  thrust  of  a  sharp 
apophthegm.  The  iron  flail  of  a  crushing  dialectic  must 
mercilessly  silence  the  self-love  that  does  not  so  much  fear 
error  as  the  shame  of  being  detected  in  it.  It  is  a  lesson 
for  all  teachers,  of  all  kinds  of  truth,  and  with  every  sort 
of  learner,  that  to  give  even  a  painful  shock  to  the  mind  by 
the  blunt  utterance  of  a  paradox  is  sometimes  the  kindest 
as  well  as  the  wisest  way  of  training  and  stimulating  it,  and 
that  next  to  a  love  of  truth  for  its  own  sake  comes  in  im- 
portance the  habit  of  an  absolute  intrepidity  in  stating  it, 
without  too  much  weighing  the  consequences,  or  too  much 
impatience  for  the  results. 

Christ's  saying  is  of  world-wide  significance.  Does  not 
each  of  you,  my  brethren,  feel  that  it  is  for  him  ?  He 
introduced  it  by  a  formula  which  with  Him  always  in- 
dicates a  change  of  subject.  "  Verily,  verily."  He  expressed 
it  in  words  which  the  Jews  immediately  afterwards  mis- 
quoted, and  which  should  be  exactly  weighed,  to  ascertain 
what  they  really  convey.  That  enemy,  whom  we  are  con- 
tinually fighting,  who  often  has  to  wait,  but  who  is  content 
to  wait,  knowing  that  he  will  have  us  at  last — "death" — 
is  a  familiar  word  enough.  My  saying  "  marks  the  whole 
revelation  of  Christ  in  its  organic  completeness,  and  not 
any  one  feature  of  it.  To  "  keep  "  expresses  rather  the  idea 
of  intent  watching  than  of  safe  guarding.  The  "  seeing  " 
death,  in  the  original,  indicates  a  long,  steady,  exhaustive 
contemplation,  whereby  we  do  not  merely  glance  at  and 
perceive,  but  become  slowly  and  increasingly  acquainted 
with  the  nature  of  the  object  we  look  at.  And  the  sentence 
paraphrased  will  run  thus :  "  Whoever  accepts,  observes, 
acts  out  My  teaching,  while  he  must  not  expect  not  to  die, 
will  find  death' when  it  comes  so  utterly  transformed  for 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH. 


him,  that  his  dread  of  it  will  be  gone ;  he  will  cease  to 
anticipate  it  with  anguish ;  nay,  he  will  conquer  even  while 
he  yields." 

First  let  us  examine  Christ's  statement  about  death,  and 
then  observe  the  magnificent  inference  that  flows  from  it. 

If  a  man  keep  My  saying,  he  shall  never  see  death." 
Death,  as  we  call  it,  affects  us  in  four  ways.  The  body 
it  ultimately  dissolves  into  its  constituent  elements,  until  it 
finally  disappears.  Even  before  it  lays  its  last  grip  on  us  it 
is  wont  to  disintegrate  the  organs  and  tissues  of  our  physical 
life  by  a  slow  and  often  humiliating  decay.  The  conscience, 
I  do  not  say  with  all,  but  certainly  with  a  great  number,  it 
penetrates  with  the  awfully  quickening  sense  of  responsibility 
and  the  apprehension  of  inevitable  judgment.  The  will, 
with  all  its  forces  and  apparatus  of  energy  and  action,  it 
goes  to  paralyze  by  a  total  and  final  suspension  of  its 
opportunities  and  aspirations.  The  heart  it  wounds  as 
widi  the  piercings  of  a  sword.  In  the  fine  expression  of  a 
living  writer,  creatures  who  love  so  much  have  their  days 
shut  round  with  a  wall  of  darkness."  All  this  is  a  mere 
matter  of  experience,  which  no  one  in  his  senses  will  care 
to  dispute.  It  would  be  easy  to  dilate  on  it  with  pathos,  or 
to  describe  it  in  thrilling  detail ;  but  each  heart  has  its  own 
sufficient  store  of  sacred  and  tender  memories,  and  we  will 
leave  the  curtain  closed.  Now,  Christ  says  about  death  that 
keeping  His  saying  will  prevent  us  from  seeing  it.  Did 
He  mean  seeing  it  before  it  comes,  or  seeing  it  when  it 
comes?  Both,  probably.  The  one  includes  the  other.  But 
the  idea^f__anticipation  is  perhaps  paramount.  The  quite 
^  young  and  the  elderly  think  of  it  most.  It  is  a  mistake 
1  constantly  to  be  thinking  of  it,  and  it  is  a  risk  never  to 
1  think  of  it.    To  scorn  it  is  a  nobler  error  than  to  dread  it, 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH. 


but  scorn  is  hardly  the  spirit  in  which  a  sinful  man  should 
wish  to  pass  to  God.  Yet  it  is  hard  not  to  be  touched  even 
to  a  melancholy  veneration  by  the  stern  resolve  of  sincere 
spirits,  unable  to  accept  revelation  in  spite  of  the  conso- 
lations it  inspires ;  expecting  to  perish,  yet  caring  to  the 
last  for  the  race  it  can  help  no  more.  Listen  to  one  of  the 
noblest  of  them ;  there  is  a  spirit  in  his  words  we  may  all 
bo  glad  to  breathe.  "  A  man  will  alieady  be  in  no  mean 
paradise,  if  at  the  hour  of  sunset  a  good  hope  shall  fall 
upon  him  like  harmonies  of  music,  that  the  earth  shall  still 
be  fair,  and  the  happiness  of  every  feeling  creature  still 
receive  a  constant  augmentation,  and  yet  each  good  cause 
find  yet  worthy  defenders,  when  the  memory  of  his  own 
poor  name  and  personality  has  long  been  blotted  out  of  the 
brief  recollection  of  men  for  ever."  ^  There  are  those,  of 
course — not  all  of  them  blatant  and  licentious  atheists — to 
whom  the  temper  of  repentance,  and  the  idea  of  a  Personal 
God,  seem  alike  impossible.  We  must  not  judge  them  ; 
we  leave  them  to  Him  who  died  for  them ;  who  reads  the 
inmost  secrets  of  their  hearts  ;  who  will  assuredly  save  them 
if  He  can ;  who,  when  they  pass  into  His  presence,  will  look 
them  through  and  through,  and  righteously  give  them  as 
their  works  shall  be. 

But  what  is  the  saying  of  Christ  which  so  changes  and 
transforms  this  "king  of  terrors;"  which  turns  what  would 
otherwise  be  an  awful  plunge  into  a  hideous  darkness  to  a 
summons  to  our  Father's  home  ?  The  doctrines  contained 
in  it  are  not  indeed  many,  but  without  dispute  they  are  un- 
speakably wonderful.  Only  Revelation  could  declare  them  ; 
only  faith  can  accept  them  as  true. 

There  is  the  Incarnation,  with  those  divinely  instituted 
*  Mr.  John  Morley. 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH.  151 

ordinances,  which  convey  sacramentally  its  benefits,  and 
extend  its  influence  to  all  who  rightly  receive  them.  There 
is  the  mystery  of  the  atoning  cross,  which  brings  peace 
and  liberty  and  reconciliation  to  all  who  approach  it  in 
simple  penitence. 

"  Nothing  in  my  hand  I  bring, 
Simply  to  Thy  cross  I  cling." 

There  is  the  resurrection,  first  of  Christ,  the  Root  and  Head 
of  humanity,  and  hereafter  of  all  who  sleep  in  Him.  There 
is  the  invisible  rule  of  the  ascended  Lord,  through  the 
Holy  Ghost,  which  He  ever  pours  out  on  the  world.  These 
mighty  truths,  in  their  order,  and  by  the  virtue  inherent  in 
them,  and  according  to  our  apprehension  of  them  and 
submission  to  them,  give  us  to  participate  even  now  in  that 
eternal  life  in  Christ  which  lives  on  world  without  end; 
and  in  that  personal  deliverance  from  the  guilt  and  power 
of  sin  which  only  a  divine  propitiation,  through  faith  in  His 
blood,  can  give  to  the  sincere  penitent ;  and  in  that  victory 
over  death  through  which  the  resurrection  at  the  last  day 
is,  by  Christ's  own  promise,  and  through  Himself  the  first- 
fruits  of  them  that  slept,  finally  and  everlastingly  to  emanci- 
pate us,  and  so  reunite  us  to  those  who  have  either  gone 
before  us,  or  shall  follow  after  us,  in  the  mighty  and  pitiful 
procession  of  humanity  ever  slowly  marching  on  towards  the 
tomb. 

These  great  truths,  and  none  but  these,  meet  the  deepest 
needs  of  our  souls  about  death,  answer  our  sores  and  diffi- 
culties, heal  our  most  beautiful  anguish,  and  in  our  best 
moments — which  are  given  us  when  we  need  them — almost 
help  us  to  call  it,  as  St.  Francis  d'Assisi  loved  to  call  it, 
"  Sister  "  Death.  Listen  to  them.  "  Whoso  eateth  My  flesh 
and  drinketh  My  blood  hath  eternal  life,  and  I  will  raise 


152 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH. 


him  up  at  the  last  day."  "  He  that  hath  the  Son  hath  life, 
and  he  that  hath  not  the  Son  of  God  hath  not  Hfe." 
"  There  is  therefore  now  no  condemnation  to  them  which 
are  in  Christ  Jesus."  "  Whosoever  liveth  and  believeth 
in  Me  shall  never  die." 

"Down  below,  the  church  to  whose  poor  window 
Glory  by  the  autumnal  leaves  is  lent ; 
And  a  knot  of  worshippers  is  mourning, 
jMissing  some  one  at  the  Sacrament. 

"Down  below,  cold  sunhght  on  the  tombstones, 
And  the  green  wet  turf  with  faded  flowers  ; 
Winter  roses,  once  like  young  hopes  burning, 
Now  beneath  the  ivy  dripped  with  showers. 

"  Up  above,  the  host  no  man  can  number, 
In  white  robes,  a  palm  in  every  hand  ; 
Each  some  work  subhme  for  ever  working 
In  the  spacious  tracts  of  that  great  land. 

"  Up  above,  the  thoughts  that  know  no  anguibh, 
Tender  care,  sweet  love  for  us  below  ; 
Noble  pity,  free  from  anxious  terror, 
Larger  love  without  a  touch  of  woe." 

(Bishop  Alexander.) 

I  said  there  is  a  significant  inference  from  this  great 
saying  of  Christ.  It  is  this  :  the  continuity  of  the  Christian's 
life,  in  its  essence,  in  its  aim,  in  its  worship,  in  its  activity, 
in  its  sanctity,  in  its  gladness.  The  life  here  and  hereafter 
is  the  same — God  dwelling  in  the  soul.  The  aim  here  and 
there  is  the  glory  of  God  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ.  The 
common  worship  is  the  same,  though  there  will  be  no  temple 
there.  "  Unto  Him  that  loved  us,  and  washed  us  from  our 
sins  in  His  own  blood,  and  hath  made  us  kings  and  priests 
unto  God  and  His  Father,  be  glory  and  dominion."  The 
activity  is  the  same.  If  in  Paradise  we  think  of  it  as  rest, 
it  is  that  kind  of  rest  which  soothes  and  girds  for  coming 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH. 


acLioD.  In  the  resurrection-life  we  shall  serve  Him  day 
and  night  in  His  temple,  hungering  no  more,  thirsting  no 
more.  The  sanctity  will  be  the  same ;  for  then,  as  now,  it 
will  be  the  image  of  Jesus  Christ  reproduced  in  us,  only 
perfectly,  and  without  spot  of  sin.  The  joy  will  be  the 
same.  Joy  in  God,  and  in  serving  Him.  The  new  song 
we  shall  sing  will  be  but  our  present  one  with  another 
stanza  to  it.  For  death  will  be  behind,  and  we  shall  see 
the  Lamb  that  was  slain.  And  as  we  stand  on  the  sea  of 
glass  mingled  with  fire — our  foe  behind  us  and  Canaan 
before — we  shall  strike  on  our  harps  even  a  nobler  melody 
than  Miriam  struck  in  the  days  of  old.  And  this  thought 
of  the  continuity  of  our  hfe  is  a  very  practical  one,  for  the 
activities  we  initiate,  the  friendships  we  fcrm,  the  hopes  we 
indulge,  the  knowledge  we  acquire. 

Life  is  so  short,  some  say,  and  so  uncertain.  Ls  there 
really  much  use  in  commencing  enterprises,  of  which 
perhaps  only  the  foundations  may  be  laid  before  we  are 
roughly  summoned  away,  and  must  perish,  like  a  child's 
castle  on  the  sand,  when  the  devouring  tide  sweeps  all  away  ? 
Love  is  natural  to  us,  essential  even.  We  are  made  to 
love.  We  cannot  help  it.  .  But  sometimes  we  frigidly 
reason  with  ourselves  about  the  folly  of  weaving  ties, 
which  when  broken — and  they  are  sure  to  be  broken 
some  day — work  and  twist  like  cruel  setons  in  our 
tortured  heart.  We  have  hopes,  generous,  reasonable, 
noble;  but  presently  we  become  almost  ashamed  of  them. 
The  frost  steals  into  our  garden  before  the  June  nights  are 
over;  we  say  in  our  haste  we  will  never  plant  flowers 
again.  As  for  knowledge,  at  the  best  it  is  but  fragmentary, 
constantly  interrupted  by  sordid  needs  and  conventional 
proprieties,  by  scanty  leisure,  and  the  torpor  of  the  weary 


154 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH. 


brain.  Just  when  we  are  beginning  to  discover  how  little 
we  can  know  and  how  little  we  do  know,  and  there  is 
rapture  as  well  as  melancholy  in  the  discovery,  the  book 
becomes  suddenly  dusty  on  an  upper  shelf;  the  midnight 
lamp  ceases  to  tell  the  passer-by  that  a  thinker  is  busy ; 
the  tired  head  is  quiet  on  the  last  pillow  it  will  ever  press  ; 
the  book  is  unfinished,  the  invention  but  half  worked  out  ; 
for  jealous,  envious  Death  is  making  yet  more  darkness. 

But  faith,  which  unites  us  to  Christ,  and  builds  us  up 
into  Him,  which  apprehends  His  purpose,  and  sees  His 
glory,  has  a  very  different  voice  to  this,  and  a  far  loftier 
one,  in  harmony  with  the  voice  of  Him  who  says,  "  Behold, 
I  make  all  things  new."  Death,  which  to  those  out  of  Christ 
is  a  state,  for  those  in  Christ  is  but  an  event  in  life ;  not 
even  interrupting  it,  but  simply  severing  its  visible  asso- 
ciation with  earth ;  not,  indeed,  at  all  parting  us  from  the 
possession  of  each  other,  only  from  the  society  of  each 
other.  Those  who  have  left  us  are  still  in  the  Father's 
house,  but  in  another  story  of  it.  Our  human  earthly  duties, 
whatever  they  be,  homely  or  august,  public  or  remote  from 
men,  are,  when  faithfully  and  truly  done,  links  in  the  great 
chain  and  girdle  of  immortal  activities,  which  death  trans- 
figures rather  than  destroys,  which  educate  and  discipline  us 
for  those  tasks  and  offices  of  service  which  God's  wisdom  is 
preparing  for  those  who  love  Him.  If  there  be  a  God,  and 
if  He  be  a  God  of  order  and  of  purpose,  most  of  all,  if  He 
be  a  Father — and  for  Christians,  at  least,  this  ought  not  be 
too  much  to  assume — we  may  rest  assured  that  the  enigmas 
of  life  will  one  day  have  their  solution,  and  the  fragments 
of  life  their  skilful  piecing  into  a  true  harmony ;  its  dis- 
cipline will  bring  it  full  recompense,  its  sorrowful  partings 
a  joyful  compensation  in  the  final  concourse  and  everlasting 


DEATH  NOT  DEATH. 


companionship  of  radiant  souls.  In  nature  they  say  there 
is  no  waste,  though  there  often  seems  to  be;  and  in  the 
higher  sphere  of  a  redeemed  creation,  God  will  justify 
Himself  to  those  who  wait  for  Him,  and  can  patiently 
trust  the  silence  of  His  veiled  face. 

This  gospel  of  the  Resurrection  is  the  greatest  force  of 
all  that  is  best  in  humanity.  Over  the  migl  ty  murmur  of  a 
turbulent  and  weeping  world  there  still  sounds  to  us  this 
voice  of  the  risen  Jesus,  sweet  as  the  dropping  of  the  honey- 
comb, solemn  as  the  sound  of  many  ^vaters — for  us  who 
have  yet  to  get  death  over,  for  all  who  have  died  and  shall 
die,  until  death  is  swallowed  up  at  the  coming  of  the  King. 

"I  am  the  Resurrection,  and  the  Life  :  he  that  believeth 
in  Me,  though  he  were  dead^  yet  shall  he  live  :  and  whoso- 
ever liveth  and  believeth  in  Me  shall  never  die.  Believest 
thou  this— believest  thou  this?" 


THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 


"  Alas  !  in  the  real  life,  how  are  we  to  know  when  we  have  reached 
our  end  ?" 


THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 


Preached  in  Winchester  Cathedral^  Advent  Sunday,  1892. 

**  And  I  saw  the  dead,  small  and  great,  stand  before  God  ;  and  the 
books  were  opened." — Rev.  xx.  12. 

Two  things  are  told  us  here,  of  more  moment  than  any- 
thing else  in  the  world.  They  are  told  us,  moreover,  on 
the  personal  authority  of  one  who  knew — knew  because  he 
had  seen.  St.  John  had  passed  behind  the  veil,  which  so 
inexorably,  yet,  it  may  be,  so  slightly,  separates  the  visible 
and  the  invisible  worlds,  and  he  came  back  to  tell  the  tale, 
which  is  short,  disappointingly  short,  yet  all,  perhaps,  that 
human  language  could  express,  or  human  understandings 
apprehend.  The  dead  live  with  God,  and  the  dead  are 
judged.  These  truths,  I  say,  not  only  transcend  all  others, 
but  modify  and  transfigure  all  others.^ 

The  event  we  call  death,  right  in  front  of  us  all,  and 
which  one  day  or  other  will  assuredly  visit  ourselves,  does 
not  terminate  existence ;  it  simply  translates  it  into  a  region 
beyond  sense,  there  to  be  emancipated  and  made  perfect. 
About  the  life  which  we  now  live  in  the  flesh,  which  often 
seems  so  trivial  and  commonplace,  and  is  so  easily  for- 
gotten, we  are  to  be  judged  by  the  living  God. 

^  See  Bishop  Phillips  Brooks'  "  Twenty  Sermons,"  p.  60. 


l60  THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 

Our  text  tells  us  of  the  dead,  the  Judge,  the  books, 
the  end. 

I.  When  we  think  of  the  dead,  of  their  number,  their 
diversity,  their  separateness,  their  society,  the  fancy  reels 
before  the  awful  vision,  the  reason  is  tempted  to  ask  if  it 
can  be  literally  true. 

Since  Abel  died  until  the  moment  when  I  spoke  my 
text,  what  a  countless  army  has  tramped,  sadly  but  in- 
evitably, through  the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death,  till  the 
corner  was  turned  and  the  angel  beckoned  them.  Take 
some  of  the  central  names  of  history,  and  cluster  round 
them  the  millions  whom  they  blessed,  or  ruled,  or  slew, 
and  they  will  seem  but  specks  in  the  great  firmament  of 
humanity,  by  their  faint  gleaming  helping  us  to  understand 
the  millions  behind  of  whom  we  know  nothing,  except  that 
they  lived,  suffered,  and  disappeared.  The  Ptolemies  and 
the  CaUphs;  the  awful  monarchs  who  ruled  on  the  banks  of 
the  Tigris  and  the  Euphrates  and  the  Nile ;  the  emperors 
who,  by  the  waters  of  the  Tiber,  conquered  and  robbed  the 
world ;  Attila  and  Tamerlane  ;  Ivan  the  terrible  and  Beli- 
sarins  the  unfortunate ;  the  Moors  and  the  Huns ;  the 
Crusaders  and  the  Turks ;  Frederick  the  Great  and  Napo- 
leon the  First ;  the  countless  myriads  of  China  and  India  ; 
Africa  and  the  islands  of  the  sea  ;  and  then  the  world  across 
the  Atlantic,  with  its  buried  strata  of  civilizations  and  races 
of  which  the  West  knows  nothing ; — what  a  mighty  crowd, 
not  yet  complete,  presently  to  stand  before  God,  for  its 
reward  or  its  doom  ! 

But  the  interest  equals  the  awfulness.  Each  human 
soul  there  is  distinct  from  every  other  human  soul — will 
have  had  its  personal  history,  and  conflicts,  and  oppor- 
tunities, and  duties.     To  each  was  given  its  number  of 


THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS.  l6l 

days,  and  its  term  of  probation.  Then  the  clock  struck, 
and  it  was  called  away.  They  are  together,  small  and 
great,"  as  the  apostle  calls  them ;  we  know  not  if  ranked  and 
placed  by  any  moral  law  ;  certainly  not  described  here  as  in 
the  Lord's  own  parable,  separated  one  from  the  other,  as  a 
shepherd  divides  the  sheep  from  the  goats,  yet  secretly  and 
severally  and  inevitably  separating  themselves  as  the  search- 
ing light  falls  on  them  from  the  white  throne  of  God.  For 
they  stand  before  God. 

11.  Here  a  word  of  explanation  may  be  useful  to  recon- 
cile what  St.  John  saw  with  what  his  Lord  declared.  Christ 
most  distinctly  taught  that  He  is  to  be  Judge,  because  He 
is  the  Son  of  man.  "  As  the  Father  hath  life  in  Himself, 
so  hath  He  given  to  the  Son  to  have  Hfe  in  Himself;  and 
hath  given  Him  authority  to  execute  judgment  also,  because 
He  is  the  Son  of  ^lan."  Also  in  the  solemn  parable  of  the 
last  judgment,  it  is  the  Son  of  Alan  who  is  to  come  in  His 
glory,  and  to  sit  on  the  throne  of  His  glory,  and  all  the 
holy  angels  with  Him.  For  as  Son  of  Man  He  has  had 
entire  experience  of  the  trials  and  sorrows  of  humanity. 
He  has  met  temptation,  and  endured  hardship,  and  wept 
tears,  and  tasted  death.  "We  have  not  an  high  priest 
which  cannot  be  touched  with  the  feeling  of  our  infirmities ; 
but  was  in  all  points  tempted  like  as  we  are,  yet  without 
sin."  Now  that  High  Priest  is  also  to  be  Judge.  But  this 
Son  of  man  is  also  Son  of  God  !  If  human  experience, 
in  one  aspect  of  His  office,  is  essential  to  His  right- 
eousness ;  on  another  side,  infinite  knowledge  is  indispen- 
sable for  the  fulfilment  of  His  task.  But  for  the  fact  that 
He  not  only  understands  man,  but  also  has  become  the 
Head  of  humanity,  and  that  each  atom  of  that  countless 
throng  has  been  created,  and  redeemed,  and  known,  and 


I62 


THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 


ruled,  and  chastened,  and  at  last  sent  for  by  Him  who  in 
His  Incarnate  Person  unites  the  almightiness  of  God  with 
the  personal  experience  of  man,  how  could  He  judge  us 
and  pronounce  our  doom  justly  ?  Unto  God,  however,  as 
we  stand  before  Him  in  that  day,  all  things  will  be  naked 
and  open,  known  and  present,  complete  and  true. 

in.  The  books  will  be  opened.  A  figure,  of  course  ! 
but  what  is  it  that  the  figure  means  ?  Five  things,  I  sup- 
pose— memory,  conscience,  character,  privilege,  and  law. 

Memory — that  wonderful,  undefinable,  insoluble  func- 
tion, so  artificial  and  so  treacherous,  ever  so  dependent 
on  physical  conditions,  often  curiously  impaired  by 
mental  wealth,  the  servant  of  our  will  and  yet  its  rebel, 
failing  us  when  we  most  need  it,  torturing  us  when  we 
could  wish  the  past  drowned  in  the  depths  of  the  sea, — this 
memory,  I  suppose,  when  we  put  off  mortaHty,  will  flood 
and  overwhelm  our  spirits ;  our  life-course  will  suddenly 
be  all  before  us,  and  with  each  most  trifling  incident  our 
personal  history  will  be  found  to  have  been  indelibly 
written  on  the  walls  of  our  own  mind. 

Conscience  will  wake,  drugged  no  longer,  partial  no 
longer.  We  can  silence  it  now  if  we  will,  and  make  our 
own  code  of  laws  for  it,  and  be  deaf  to  it  when  it  displeases 
us,  or,  what  is  worse  still,  coax  or  force  it  into  a  courtly 
guest  that  never  is  so  uncivil  as  to  reproach  us,  or  to  say 
us  nay.  When  we  see  the  Judge,  all  these  deceits  and 
phantasms  will  be  swept  away  in  one  tremendous  moment ; 
we  shall  see  ourselves  as  we  really  are,  and  as  God  has 
ever  seen  us  ;  but  who  may  abide  the  day  of  His  coming, 
and  who  shall  stand  when  He  appeareth  ?  " 

There  is  character.  What  we  shall  be  then,  will  be 
the  moral  and  spiritual  result  of  our  entire  conscious  lives. 


THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS.  1 63 

Just  as  the  washing  of  a  pebble  on  the  shore,  or  the  flight 
of  a  condor  on  the  Andes,  or  the  hurricane  that  devastates 
a  forest,  or  even  the  soft  sweet  murmur  of  a  turtle-dove  in 
spring,  makes  its  mark  and  leaves  its  impression  on  the 
entire  material  universe,  so  nothing  that  we  do  or  say,  or 
think  or  wish,  but  leaves  an  impression  of  some  kind  on 
our  spiritual  being.  The  loftiest  saint  and  the  foulest 
sinner  will  each  be  the  workmanship  of  his  own  actions. 
As  v,-e  live  we  die;  as  we  die  we  are  judged.  We  shall 
have  either  dug  our  grave  or  earned  our  crown.  "  He 
that  is  unjust,  let  him  be  unjust  still :  and  he  which  is 
filthy,  let  him  be  filthy  still :  and  he  that  is  righteous,  let 
him  be  righteous  still :  and  he  that  is  hol}^,  let  him  be 
holy  still.  And  behold,  I  come  quickly ;  and  My  reward 
is  with  Me,  to  give  every  man  according  as  his  work 
shall  be." 

Then  there  is  privilege,  which  I  suppose  to  be  the  idea 
contained  under  the  figure  of  the  book  of  life.  This  book 
is  not,  I  take  it,  applicable  to  ancient  pagandom  or  modern 
heathendom,  or  to  any  of  those  who  have  lived  and  died 
outside  the  opportunities  of  Christ.  It  refers  specially  to 
those  who  have  been  outwardly  admitted  into  the  fellowship 
of  Christ's  body ;  to  whom,  with  more  or  less  fulness  and 
frequency  and  power,  Christ  has  been  presented  as  Saviour 
and  Lord ;  about  whom  it  will  be  possible  and  true  for 
Him  to  say,  Ye  would  not  come  unto  Me  that  ye  might 
have  life."  When  the  Lord  says  to  the  Church  at  Sardis, 
"  He  that  overcometh,  the  same  shall  be  clothed  in  white 
raiment ;  and  I  will  not  blot  his  name  out  of  the  book 
of  life,"  we  see  a  fact,  not  a  hope :  there  is  plain  warning 
of  what  must  happen  were  the  Church  to  deserve  it,  and- 
no  mere  dramatic  threat  of  something  which  could  never 


164  THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 

happen.  It  tells  us  of  a  book  in  which  names  are  written, 
for  the  Saviour  yearned  for  their  salvation ;  and  a  book 
out  of  which  names  can  be  blotted,  for  the  only  thing 
that  separates  from  the  love  of  God  is  wilful  and  repeated 
sin. 

"And  Moses  returned  unto  the  Lord,  and  said,  Oh, 
this  people  have  sinned  a  great  sin,  and  have  made  them 
gods  of  gold.  Yet  now,  if  Thou  wilt  forgive  their  sin — ; 
and  if  not,  blot  me,  I  pray  Thee,  out  of  Thy  book  which 
Thou  hast  written.  And  the  Lord  said  unto  Moses,  Whoso- 
ever hath  sinned  against  Me,  him  will  I  blot  out  of  My 
book." 

Once  more,  there  is  the  book  of  the  Divine  Law  and 
Will,  written  and  unwritten,  from  which  there  will  be  no 
escape,  which  no  one  then  will  try  to  explain  away, 
or  pretend  it  was  not  for  him.  "  Heaven  and  earth  shall 
pass  away,  but  My  words  shall  not  pass  away ; "  "  He 
that  rejecteth  Me,  and  receiveth  not  My  words,  hath  One 
that  judgeth  him :  the  word  that  I  have  spoken,  the  same 
shall  judge  him  in  the  last  day." 

IV.  Then  the  end.  Listen  to  the  beloved  apostle  of  love, 
who  leaned  on  Jesus'  breast  at  supper — the  disciple  whom 
Jesus  loved.  "  They  were  judged  every  man  according  to 
their  works  .  .  .  and  whosoever  was  not  found  written  in  the 
book  of  life  was  cast  into  the  lake  of  fire."  My  brethren, 
the  gospel  has  its  terrible  side  as  well  as  its  pitiful.  We  read 
of  the  love  of  Christ  which  passeth  knowledge;  we  read 
also,  and  in  this  very  book,  of  the  wrath  of  the  Lamb.  We 
must  not  impoverish  our  holy  faith  of  all  its  warnings,  and 
dwell  only  on  its  exceeding  precious  promises.  Against 
human  accommodations  and  modern  standards  of  divine 
righteousness  we  must  set  the  words  of  Scripture  and  the 


THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 


165 


severity  of  Christ.  Retribution  is  inevitable,  if  sin  is  sinful, 
and  if  character  is  permanent.  Fire  is  a  striking  illustration 
of  the  agony  of  self-reproach,  and  of  the  awful  tyranny  of 
indulged  evil.  It  is  not  for  us  to  try  to  be  wise  beyond 
what  is  written,  or  to  peer  with  a  perilous  inquisitiveness 
into  the  secrets  of  that  future  discipline  which,  for  wise 
purposes  of  His  own,  the  Judge  of  all  the  earth  has  not 
made  plain  to  man.  This  we  are  sure  of,  "  Now  is  the 
accepted  time,  now  is  the  day  of  salvation  ; "  and  how  shall 
we  escape  if  we  neglect  it  ?  Can  there  be  a  second  cross 
in  the  life  to  come,  with  another  Saviour  on  whom  to  cast 
the  burden  of  unrepented  sins  ? 

To  conclude  :  i.  In  the  last  judgment  we  shall  all  stand 
together  before  the  Judge.  j\Iy  brethren,  do  we  sufficiently 
understand  that  severally  and  separately  we  are  all  standing 
before  Him  now?  We  are  always  standing  before  Him, 
and  by  the  self-acting,  inevitable  process  of  His  pene- 
trating righteousness  He  is  always  judging  us.  It  has 
been  strikingly  observed  that  in  all  departments  of  life 
we  are  brought  face  to  face  with  ideal  standards,  which 
are  just  so  many  tribunals  before  which  even  now  we  live 
and  are  judged.  The  child  stands  before  his  parents,  the 
poet  before  nature,  the  preacher  before  the  Word  of  God, 
the  legislator  before  justice.  Our  final  and  aggregate  judg- 
ment is  accumulating  moment  by  moment  before  God, 
though  unspoken  and  secret.  The  verdict  will  be  declared 
when  the  Judge  comes  in  His  glory,  but  it  is  being  earned 
now.  How  this  thought  should  solemnize  life  while  it 
dignifies  it,  steady  it  while  it  matures  it  for  the  final 
reward,  compensate  it  for  unjust  censures  and  withheld 
commendation,  enrich  it  with  the  hope  of  glory  in  the 
presence  of  the  King  ! 


1 66  THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 

2.  For,  in  a  very  real  sense,  while  human  judgment  must 
be  imperfect,  and  shallow,  and  one-sided,  and  tainted  with 
prejudice,  and  too  often  on  the  severe  side,  it  is  never- 
theless inevitable,  being  the  simple  process  of  the  sense  of 
right  and  wrong  within  us.  Not  to  exercise  it  might  mean 
levity,  and  indifference  to  evil.  The  same  apostle  who  has 
said,  "  Judge  nothing  before  the  time  until  the  Lord  come," 
has  also  said,  "  He  that  is  spiritual  judge th  all  things."  We 
are  to  mature  our  judgments,  though  not  always  to  express 
them ;  we  ought  to  judge  acts,  we  must  not  judge  motives. 
We  never  see  more  than  part  of  a  subject,  and  we  should 
be  slow  to  condemn,  unless  all  the  facts  are  before  us. 
Charity  should  mellow  us;  the  consciousness  of  our  own 
infirmities  should  make  us  humble  and  tender  with  our 
brethren.  Nevertheless,  human  opinion,  rash  and  hasty 
as  it  may  sometimes  be,  is  a  real  bulwark  and  protection 
to  human  society.  On  the  whole,  its  verdicts  are  right, 
though  severe ;  each  in  turn  suffers  from  them,  but  the 
community  is  saved. 

Once  more,  St.  John  tells  us  at  the  beginning  of  the 
Apocalypse,  Every  eye  shall  see  Him,  and  they  also 
which  pierced  Him,  and  all  kindreds  of  the  earth  shall 
wail  because  of  Him."  My  brethren,  you  who  know  Him 
and  love  Him,  have  you  ever  seriously  asked  yourselves, 
when  first  you  behold  Him,  what  your  feeling  will  be?  St. 
John,  we  know,  fell  at  His  feet  as  dead.  When  the  vision 
of  that  awful  holiness  and  majestic  beauty  first  strikes  on 
the  soul,  it  will  be  a  strange  mingling  of  agony  and 
rapture ;  agony  that  we  should  have  thought  so  lightly  of 
Him  and  so  grievously  have  sinned  against  His  wonderful 
love,  rapture  that  we  possess  Him  at  last.  We  cannot 
possibly  imagine  what  it  will  be  to  be  face  to  face  for  the 


THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 


167 


first  time  in  the  body  with  the  visible  incarnate  righteous- 
ness of  God.  We  shall  not  wish  to  flee  from  it ;  in  a  sense 
we  shall  welcome  it.  It  may  be  only  for  a  moment,  but  in 
that  tremendous  moment  we  shall  seem  to  live  many  lives. 
Now  we  have  such  shallow  thoughts  of  sin,  and  such  feeble 
longings  after  holiness.  Our  sacrifices  are  so  few,  and  our 
devotion  so  cold.  But  when  we  see  Him  as  He  is,  and  by 
seeing  Him  are  transformed  into  the  glory  of  His  likeness, 
the  pain  of  the  resurrection-birth,  though  quick,  may  be  a 
keen  anguish.^ 

Lastly,  there  will  be  no  terror,  only  unspeakable  rever- 
ence. We  shall  not  fear,  for  "perfect  love  casteth  out  fear;" 
and  this  same  apostle  tells  us  "that  we  may  have  boldness" 
— or  freedom  of  speech — "  in  the  day  of  judgment :  because 
as  He  is,  so  are  we  in  this  world."  By  freedom  of  speech 
is  meant,  I  conceive,  the  song  of  Moses  and  of  the 
Lamb,  and  as  in  woeful  contrast  with  the  dumbness  and 
speechlessness  of  those  who  have  already  condemned 
themselves,  and  listened  to  what  is  but  the  approved 
verdict  of  their  own  consciences.  They  will  then  have 
no  excuses  to  make  for  having  neglected  the  King's 
invitation  :  no  wedding  garment  will  again  be  offered  for 
the  marriage  supper  of  the  Lamb.  Isaiah  says,  "  He  will 
swallow  up  death  in  victory,  and  the  Lord  God  will  wipe 
away  tears  from  off  all  faces,  ....  And  it  shall  be 
said  in  that  day,  Lo,  this  is  our  God ;  we  have  waited 
for  Him,  and  He  will  save  us  :  this  is  the  Lord ;  we 
have  waited  for  Him_,  we  vv'ill  be  glad  and  rejoice  in  His 
salvation." 

You  are  now  living  on  earth.    Are  you  living  to  God  or 

^  This  thought  will  be  found  much  more  strikingly  expressed  in  the 
"  Dream  of  Gerontius." 


l68  THE  OPENING  OF  THE  BOOKS. 


to  self?  Do  you  feel  that  Christ  has  any  claim  on  you? 
Are  you  in  any  real  sense,  inadequate  and  insignificant  as 
it  may  be,  striving  to  live  for  His  glory  ?  Will  you  have 
anything  to  show  Him  that  you  have  done  for  Him,  any 
usury  for  the  gifts  and  opportunities  you  enjoy  ? 

Some  day  you  will  die;  but  no  one  knows,  save  God, 
how,  and  when,  and  where.  Are  you  fit  to  die  ?  To  the 
Christian  it  is  merely  putting  off  a  garment,  and  going  into 
another  room,  and  leaving  friends  here  for  friends  elsewhere 
— a  journey  from  which  you  will  not  return,  but  to  a  Father's 
house  with  many  mansions.  Have  you  cast  your  sins  on 
your  Saviour  ?  Have  you  surrendered  to  Him  your  life  ? 
Can  you  say,  "  I  know  whom  I  have  believed,"  and  that 
Though  I  pass  through  the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death. 
Thou  art  with  me  "  ?  Are  you  in  any  real  sense  using  your 
gifts,  your  opportunities,  your  leisure,  your  reason,  for  His 
glory? 

You  will  be  judged.  Will  the  Judge  claim  you  as  His 
possession,  welcome  you  as  His  disciple,  crown  you  as 
His  servant,  invite  you  into  His  joy?  or  will  He  say,  "I 
know  you  not,  depart  from  Me  "  ? 

''And  I  saw  the  dead,  small  and  great,  stand  before 
God ;  and  the  books  were  opened." 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


"The  brightest  crown  of  action  is  good  done  for  wliich  there  is  no 
reward." 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


Preached  in  Rochester  Cathedral^  December  3,  1890. 

"And  they  shall  see  His  face;  and  His  Name  "shall  be  in  their 
foreheads." — Rev.  xxii.  4. 

Scholars  differ,  as  often  elsewhere  they  differ,  about  the 
time  of  this  seeing  of  God.  Is  it  the  final  reward  of  the 
beatific  vision,  when  the  purged  eyes  shall  see  the  King 
in  his  beauty,  and,  like  Bartimaeus  of  old,  look  up  at  that 
ineffable  and  solemn  and  tender  face  with  wonder  and 
self-abasement;  or  is  it  that  insight  and  contemplation  of 
faith,  whereby  the  eye  of  the  regenerate  spirit,  "  beholding 
as  in  a  glass  the  glory  of  the  Lord,  is  changed  into  the 
same  image  from  glory  to  glory,  even  as  by  the  Spirit  of 
the  Lord"? 

In  truth  it  is  both,  and  if  there  are  not  both,  there  will 
be  neither.  AVe  must  see  Him  here,  or  we  shall  never  see 
Him  after  death,  save  as  they  shall  see  Him  who  will  wail 
because  of  Him.  Heaven,  which  is  the  vision  of  God, 
must  begin  in  us  now  if  it  is  to  be  fulfilled  to  us  hereafter ; 
the  heavenly  places  mean  the  invisible  presence  of  the  in- 
visible God. 

The  text — promise,  shall  I  not  call  it? — contains  two 
chief  ideas  :  the  vision  and  the  result. 


i;2 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


I.  The  vision.  "They  shall  see  His  face."' 
Advent— the  Second  Advent,  that  is — implies  three 
separated,  though  connected  epochs :  the  anticipation ; 
the  judgment  ;  the  glory.  For  each  of  these  there  is  a 
special  vision  of  God,  exceptionally,  though  not  exclusively, 
belonging  to  it.  And  while  each  of  the  three  in  measure 
and  degree  is  more  or  less  appreciated  and  recognized  by 
the  devout  spirit,  the  time  of  judgment  has  a  wider  and 
deeper  comprehension  than  the  time  of  waiting ;  and  all 
three  unite  and  culminate  in  the  last. 

To  see  God,  is  not  to  behold  Him  with  the  organs  of 
sense.  In  this  meaning,  "No  man  hath  seen  God  at  any 
time  " — ever  can,  ever  will  see  Him.  It  is  to  apprehend 
Him  in  His  purpose  and  attributes  and  character.  In 
other  words,  to  observe  His  order,  and  accept  His  righteous- 
ness, and  know  His  love.  What  we,  who  are  between  the 
Accents,  have  to  do,  is  continually  and  reverently,  and 
even  tliankfuUy,  to  cultivate  the  sense  of  a  divine  superin- 
tending will ;  to  live  moment  by  moment  in  the  awful  but 
sustaining  presence  of  the  moral  Governor  of  the  world  ; 
and  ever  to  be  sure,  even  though  clouds  and  darkness  are 
round  about  Him,  justice  and  judgment  are  the  habitation 
of  His  seat.  We  all  deeply  need  in  this  time  of  ours — 
Christian  men  especially,  if  they  would  shine  as  lights  in 
the  world — to  appreciate  and  cultivate  and  pass  on  the 
deep  and  imperturbable  conviction  that  we  are  not  help- 
lessly drifting  in  the  abyss  of  a  moral  chaos,  but  that  this 
wonderful,  beautiful,  sorrowful,  perplexing  world  is  being 
ruled  by  no  iron  hand,  by  no  stolid  fate,  by  no  arbitrary 
tyrant,  by  no  unstable  caprice,  but  by  a  Father,  who, 
while  He  does  not  now  choose  to  give  account  of  any  of 
His  matters  to  those  who  must  learn  to  trust  before  they 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


1/3 


can  understand,  will  give  account  of  them  presently,  will 
justify  Himself  before  the  universe  as  wise  and  just  and 
good.  Let  us  confess  it  is  not  always  easy  to  trace  this 
order,  or  to  comprehend  it.  Gordon  dies — perhaps  does 
more  for  us  by  dying  than  by  living ;  but  the  question 
comes.  Why  was  he  let  die  ?  Are  there  so  many  of  such 
that  the  world  can  easily  spare  them  ?  The  waste  places 
of  humanity,  not  only  in  Africa  but  in  England,  reek  with 
seeds  of  moral  pestilence.  The  nation's  conscience  is 
stirred  for  a  moment,  and  then  slumbers  again.  It  takes 
a  woefully  long  time  not  only  to  discover  the  remedies,  but 
to  apply  them.  When  the  healing  comes,  we  so  of'ten  hear 
the  paralyzing  message,  "  Thy  daughter  is  dead ;  why 
troublest  thou  the  Master?"  ''Too  late"  burns  itself  in 
letters  of  fire  on  the  soul.  From  the  tempter  and  the  op- 
pressor, hundreds  of  victims  and  mourners  pass  daily  to 
where  the  wicked  cease  from  troubling,  and  where  the  weary 
are  at  rest  We  can  only  look  up  above  the  silent  stars, 
and  penetrate  with  an  eager  and  invisible  faith  to  the  throne 
of  Him  who  bides  His  time  now,  as  in  the  days  of  His 
flesh ;  who,  if  He  seems  asleep  on  a  pillow  while  His 
Church  is  tossed  in  the  storm,  is  ready  to  be  aroused  by 
her  even  impatient  devotion  ;  who  sitteth  above  the 
waterfloods  a  King  for  ever  :  who  bids  us  wait  and  trust, 
for  He  is  at  the  door. 

In  judgment  we  shall  see  His  righteousness ;  and  do  we 
know  what  that  means,  and  are  we  likely  to  be  able  to  bear 
it  ?  As  said  the  prophet  of  old,  Who  may  abide  the  day 
of  His  coming  ?  and  who  shall  stand  when  He  appeareth  ? 
for  He  is  like  a  refiner's  fire,  and  like  fullers'  soip.''  But 
in  judgment  we  shall  come  face  to  face  with  a  spotless 
purity  such  as  no  fuller  on  earth  could  whiten  :  with  an 


174 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


ineffable  holiness  before  which  the  very  heavens  are  not 
dean ;  with  a  justice  which  in  infallible  balances  will 
weigh  the  merits  and  demerits  of  each  human  soul ;  with 
a  love  which,  while  it  passeth  knowledge,  will  help  us, 
maybe  to  our  despair,  to  discover  what  love  means.  Think 
what  the  revelation  will  be  when  it  first  bursts  upon  us  in 
that  tremendous  moment ;  what  the  contrast  between  His 
perfection  and  our  shortcomings,  in  a  gulf  that  will  seem 
to  sever  the  Saviour  even  from  the  saved. 

When  He  comes  to  judge,  seeing  Him  will  make  us  see 
ourselves,  admiring  Him  will  make  us  loathe  ourselves, 
adoring  Him  will  make  us  abase  ourselves ;  and  yet,  if  we 
have  on  this  side  of  death  cast  ourselves  on  Him  that  He 
may  save  us,  yielded  ourselves  to  Him  that  He  may  use  us, 
contemplated  Him  and  fed  on  Him  in  His  ordinances  that 
He  may  sanctify  us,  and  committed  ourselves  to  Him  that 
He  may  keep  us  safe  in  His  everlasting  arms,  there  will  be 
no  baseness  and  no  remorse  in  our  wonder,  and  even  anguish ; 
His  righteousness  will  not  crush  us,  for  it  will  be  ours  as 
well  as  His.  "  Beloved,  now  are  we  the  sons  of  God,  and  it 
doth  not  yet  appear  what  we  shall  be  :  but  we  know  that, 
when  He  shall  appear,  we  shall  be  like  Him;  for  we  shall 
see  Him  as  He  is."  In  glory,  to  which  we  go  when  the 
judgment  is  over,  to  reign  for  ever  and  ever,  we  shall  see 
His  love  as  no  one  can  see  it  now.  There  will  be  the  love 
of  His  providence :  "  How  that  the  Lord  thy  God  bare 
thee,  as  a  man  doth  bear  his  son,  in  all  the  way  that 
ye  went,  until  ye  came  into  this  place ;  .  .  .  who  went  in 
the  way  before  you,  to  search  you  out  a  place  to  pitch 
your  tents  in,  in  fire  by  night,  to  show  you  by  what  way 
ye  should  go,  and  in  a  cloud  by  day."  The  providence 
which  disappointed  us  in  what  was  hurtful,  only  to  give 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


us  greater  blessing  in  the  end;  the  providence  that 
suffered  us  to  go  on  for  a  while  in  the  way  of  our  own 
wilfulness,  until  we  had  more  than  enough  of  it,  and  crept 
back  like  tired  and  truant  children  into  a  kind  mother's 
arms ;  the  providence  that  chastened  us  for  our  profit,  that 
we  might  be  partakers  of  His  holiness ;  the  providence 
that  prepared  us  for  our  duties  before  we  were  summoned 
to  them,  and  that  purged  us  of  pride  and  earthliness,  to 
make  the  blessing  safe  with  which  He  longed  to  stir  our 
joy;  the  providence  which  pitied  the  helplessness  of  our 
childhood,  bore  with  the  petulance  of  our  youth,  satisfied 
the  necessities  of  our  manhood,  dignified  and  blessed  our 
ripening  years.  We  shall  see  it  all  and  understand  it  all 
then ;  the  Master's  word  will  be  verified  to  the  full : 
"  What  I  do  thou  knowest  not  now,  but  thou  shalt  know 
hereafter."  The  psalmist's  experiences  will  be  that  of 
each  single  soul  in  the  great  multitude  that  no  man  can 
number :  Oh,  what  great  troubles  and  adversities  hast 
thou  shown  me  !  Yet  didst  thou  turn  again  and  refresh 
me;  yea,  and  broughtest  me  from  the  deep  of  the  eartli 
again." 

But  if  the  love  of  His  providence  will  seem  wonderful, 
how  much  more  wonderful  will  be  the  love  of  His  redemp- 
tion !  For  then  we  shall  see  the  sinfulness  of  sin  as  we 
never  saw  it  before ;  then  we  shall  see  the  majesty  of  the 
Eternal  Godhead  as  we  never  comprehended  it  before ;  then 
we  shall  see  the  meaning  of  salvation  as  we  could  not  see  it 
till  it  was  ours,  all  ours — ours  in  body  and  soul  in  the  resur- 
rection-glory;  then  we  shall  see  to  what  depth  of  shame, 
and  loneliness,  and  disappointment,  and  agony  the  Redeemer 
stooped,  when  He  took  flesh  that  He  might  be  *'the  Saviour 
of  the  world."      Unto  Him  that  loved  us,  and  washed  us 


i;6 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


from  our  sins  in  His  own  blood,"  will  be  the  anthem  new 
every  morning  and  fresh  every  night.  The  more  we  grow 
in  the  image  of  God,  and  are  in  sympathy  with  the  purpose 
of  God,  and  are  jealous  for  the  glory  of  God,  and  are 
instructed  in  the  perfection  of  God,  the  more  amazed  shall 
we  be  that  creatures  so  vile  as  we  could  deserve  His  pity ; 
the  more  will  the  apostle's  judgment  justify  itself  to  us  : 
"  God  commendeth  His  love  to  us,  in  that,  while  we  were 
yet  sinners,  Christ  died  for  us." 

II.  Such  is  the  vision.  What  is  the  result  ?  "  His  Name 
shall  be  in  their  foreheads."  His  Name  means  Himself. 
To  paraphrase  it  in  the  most  direct  and  simple  way,  "  God 
shall  be  seen  in  their  very  face."  This,  too,  has  its  inchoate 
and  partial  accomplishment  now.  In  the  apostles'  time, 
men  took  knowledge  of  them  that  they  had  been  with 
Jesus.  And  as  they  were  stoning  Stephen,  one  who  heard 
and  wrote  of  it  said  of  him  that  his  face  was  as  the  face 
of  an  angel ;  and  there  are  those  now — we  all  know  them, 
though  there  are  not  too  many  of  them — who  by  the  bright- 
ness in  their  eye,  and  the  purity  in  their  face,  and  the 
calmness  of  their  brow,  and  the  gentle  dignity  of  their 
manner — though  not  only  by  these — make  us  feel  and  know 
that  they  breathe  the  air,  and  wear  the  dress,  and  speak 
the  language,  and  frequent  the  court  of  the  King  of 
kings ;  and  who  by  their  words,  and  deeds,  and  motives, 
and  principles,  and  sacrifices,  and  devotion,  make  the 
discipleship  of  Christ  a  real  and  beautiful  confession,  and 
the  personality  of  Christ  one  of  the  vital  forces  of  the 
world. 

Hereafter  it  will  be  more  so  than  ever ;  yet  initially,  in 
exact  proportion  to  its  sweetness  and  potency  here.  Each 
saint  in  glory  will  have  his  new  name,  and  everybody  will 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


177 


know  it  and  call  him  by  it.  It  will  be  God's  Name  and  yet 
liis  own ;  no  one  else  will  have  it  but  he,  and  it  will 
become  his  through  what  he  has  learnt,  and  used,  and 
suffered,  and  done  for  the  Lord  on  earth.  As  the  founda- 
tions of  the  wall  of  the  city  will  be  garnished  with  all 
manner  of  precious  stones,  each  saint  in  that  glorified 
throng  will  be  a  separate  gem,  expressive  of  its  own  dis- 
tinct individuality  in  gifts,  in  capacities,  in  experience, 
in  holiness.  Each,  like  St.  Paul  even  in  his  mortal  body, 
will  bear  on  him  the  marks  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  Each  will 
have  his  own  crown,  and  his  own  robe,  and  his  own  throne, 
and  his  own  service.  But  the  colours  of  each  gem  will  be 
radiant  with  the  glory  of  God  most  high,  and  in  each  of 
His  precious  jewels  will  sparkle  and  flash  the  beauty  of 
Him  who  had  for  it  His  own  ideal  from  the  foundation 
of  the  world ;  who  Himself  washed  it  from  its  daily  stains 
in  His  own  most  precious  blood,  as  the  condition  of  its 
unity  with  Him,  and  as  the  method  of  its  growing  edifica- 
tion unto  Him ;  and  thereby  will  see  of  the  travail  of  His 
soul  and  be  satisfied  in  each  one  of  His  elect,  as  they  walk 
in  Avhite  at  His  side. 

May  I  press  on  you  some  last  thoughts  which  seem 
unspeakably  precious  for  you,  and  in  the  truth  of  which 
I  myself  strive  to  live,  and  humbly  hope  to  die  ? 

I.  Long,  strive,  pray,  to  see  more  and  more  of  God,  as 
your  Life,  and  Hope,  and  Rest,  and  exceeding  Joy.  He  is 
to  be  seen,  be  sure  of  that,  but  only  and  always  in  Christ ; 
not  at  a  moment's  notice,  nor  by  repeating  a  collect  or 
two,  nor  by  a  cheap  service.  But  He  can  be  seen — really 
felt  and  seen  by  the  eye  of  the  spirit,  just  in  proportion  as 
we  hate  and  resist  and  overcome  sin.  Nothing  blinds  the 
spiritual  power  of  seeing  like  sin — sin  of  any  kind,  whether 

N— 15 


178 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


of  the  tlesh  or  the  spirit.  See  that  you  hate  the  thing 
that  is  evil.  Be  very  stern  with  it  in  yourselves.  Be 
pitiful  and  gentle,  but  uncompromising  with  it  in  others. 
"  Blessed  are  the  pure  in  heart :  for  they  shall  see  God  " 
— yes,  see  God  now.  There  is  no  blessedness,  no  dignity, 
no  peace,  in  the  world  that  comes  up  to  his  who  can 
say,  "  I  have  seen  God,  and  He  has  come  to  live  in  my 
heart." 

2.  Again,  you  must  not  expect  always  to  see  Him  with 
the  same  precision  and  distinctness  and  power.  The  sun 
does  not  shine  in  November  as  it  shines  in  July ;  and,  besides, 
there  is  always  night  for  many  hours  all  the  year  round. 
But  He  can  see  you  ;  and  when  He  sees  you  need  it.  He 
will  show  Himself  to  you  as  you  really  desire  it.  He  will 
say,  Mary  !  "  you  will  say,  My  Lord  and  my  God  !  "  In 
a  real  sense  it  is  necessary  to  deserve  these  revelations  of 
God ;  and  they  are  usually,  though  sparingly,  given  as  helps 
and  solaces  for  duty  or  suffering.  We  need  not  make  too 
much  of  them,  but  we  must  not  make  too  little  of  them. 
The  recollection  of  them,  when  they  are  over,  as  with  the 
disciples  going  to  Emmaus,  helps  us  to  wait  till  they 
return. 

3.  I  spoke  just  now  of  deserving  these  beatific  glimpses 
of  the  face  of  God  ;  and  I  meant  it.  But  we  deserve  them 
only  by  showing  our  desire  for  them,  and  by  qualifying  our- 
selves to  use  them  when  they  come.  The  two  conditions  of 
deserving  them  are  sacrifice  and  devotion.  Sacrifice  means 
capacity  for  God.  For  it  springs  from  love  ;  and  "  he  that 
loveth  dwelleth  in  God,  and  God  in  him."  Each  soul  has 
to  take  counsel  with  itself  what  God  is  worth  at  its  hands  ; 
and  what  God  seems  worth,  that  the  soul  will  give  Him. 
God  cannot  show  Himself  at  all  to  the  blinded  soul,  and 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


1/9 


to  the  half-opened  soul  He  can  only  show  Himself  a 
little.  But  when  love  unlocks  the  heart,  God  is  seen  as  He 
is,  so  far  as  mortal  eye  can  see  Him,  and  the  soul  is  filled 
with  His  glory.  There  is  another  way — that  of  devotion — 
devotion,  which  includes  the  constant  study  of  His  Word. 
It  was  as  the  disciples  walked  together  the  first  Easter 
evening,  conversing  of  Him,  and  their  hearts  full  of  Him, 
that  Jesus  joined  Himself  to  them,  and  walked  at  their  side, 
and  listened  to  them  when  they  said,  "Abide  with  us,"  and 
went  in  to  tarry  with  them.  To  be  in  constant  fellowship 
with  God,  in  the  conscientious  discharge  of  duty,  in  the 
practice  of  gentle  charity  and  truth  man  with  man,  in  the 
simplicity  of  spiritual  worship,  and  in  the  aiming  after  even 
greater  holiness,  is  the  one  and  the  only  and  the  victorious 
secret  of  living  in  the  presence  of  God. 

]\Iy  brethren,  in  a  little  while  all  that  now  shuts  out 
the  actual  face  of  Jesus  will  have  disappeared.  This 
garment  of  flesh  will  have  disappeared  into  the  grave. 
These  bodily  senses,  essential  to  our  present  condition, 
will  be  transformed  and  transfigured  in  the  resurrection- 
glory.  We  shall  see  Him  face  to  face,  about  whom  now 
we  feebly  stammer,  like  infants  learning  an  alphabet :  and 
my  last  question  to  you  is — When  He  comes,  and  you  see 
Him  at  last,  and  He  asks  you  what  you  have  learnt  of 
Him,  and  done  or  suffered  for  Him,  what  shall  you  have 
to  say  ?  Will  He  be  able  to  welcome  you  and  to  crown 
you;  or  must  He  send  you  into  the  darkness,  with  His 
holy,  tender  face  sadly  turned  away  ? 

When  that  day  comes — it  is  coming,  and  it  may  be  very 
near — may  we  be  all  found  together,  with  His  Name  on 
our  foreheads  and  His  praises  on  our  lips,  thankful  as 
those  who  on  earth  have  gone  to  the  house  of  God  together ; 


i8o 


THE  VISION  OF  GOD. 


to  meet  again  for  ever  in  that  blessed  city,  where  there  is 
no  temple,  ''for  the  Lord  God  Almighty  and  the  Lamb 
are  the  Temple  of  it  j "  and  which  hath  no  need  of  the  sun 
or  of  the  moon  to  lighten  it,  "for  the  glory  of  God  will 
lighten  it,  and  the  Lamb  is  the  Light  thereof." 


BIBLIOGRAPHY. 


Questions  of  Faith  and  Duty.  Fourth  Thousand. 
Crown  8vo,  5^'.  Isbister. 

The  Yoke  of  Christ.  Twelfth  Thousand.  Crown  8vo, 
5jr.  Isbister. 

The  Gospel  of  Christ.  Sixth  Thousand.  Crown  8vo, 
4-N\  dd.  Isbister. 

The  Claim  of  Christ  on  the  Young.  Third  Thousand. 
Crown  8vo,  2s.  6d.  Isbister. 

The  Presence  of  Christ,  Nineteenth  Thousand.  Crown 
8vo,  3^.  6d.  Isbister. 

On  the  Loss  of  Friends.    Sewed,  3^. 

On  Being  III.    Sewed,  3^. 


I.OXDOX  :  PRINTED  BY  WILLIAM  CLOWES  AND  SONS,  LIMITED, 
STAMFORD  STREET  AND  CHARING  CROSS. 


